We are who we choose to be
by Rainbowhawk1993
Summary: Kerrigan is now moments away from quenching her thirst for vengence. But her journey had come at a very great cost to her and the one whom she hurt the most. But in the darkness she put him in, James Raynor begins to see a light of hope for the one he still believes in.
1. Part 1

Part 1

Raynor opened his eyes and felt his mind return to reality. He grimaced as he moved his stiff body and sat up in his bed in the Captain's Quarters. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and sat on the edge. He held his head in his hands as he attempted to clear his mind.

When he was freed from the Moros, he was flown back to the Hyperion and sent straight to the med bay. The docs didn't find many serious conditions. He did have some malnutrition and he did experience some interrogation when he was held captive. The interrogations weren't as bad considering he learned how to resist them during the guild wars when he met Cole Hickson. The docs suggested that he'd rest in the med bay after he was given a meal but Raynor turned it down and retreated to the Captains' Quarters. The docs also strongly suggested that he'd not consume any alcohol while he recovered. That was one thing that Raynor could not, especially after seeing what happened. He had a secret stash of whiskey inside of his quarters and he indulged the bottle shot-by-shot until he collapsed on his bed.

All he could think of when he was in the tiny holding cell was what Sarah would do when she realized that he wasn't returning to her. After months of seeing nothing but the pitch black walls of his cell, he felt the entire ship shack and rattle. He heard guns firing and men shouting and screaming behind the steel door and it grew louder and louder until he saw the door compress and blown from its hinges. Afterword, he saw someone walk into his cell with his eyes that adjusted to the light peering in from the opened door. When he first saw who came into the room, he felt revealed when he saw what he thought was the one person that he cared about going out of her way to save him. But that hopeful feeling was crushed and shattered when his worst nightmare came when he saw those all-too-familiar wings emerge from behind her.

The ghost that haunted him and gave him so much grief for so long came on that infamous day four years ago when she was betrayed and left for dead and he was powerless to do anything about it. Then he heard a wispier from a far that said that she was still alive. But the hope he had of getting rid of that ghost that lingered in him only lead to more pain when he saw what really had become of her when he arrived where she was calling for help. He didn't know what do next when he realized his efforts were in vain. But when his instincts kicked in, he moved along when the war escalated and swept him along with it. After fighting alongside an alien race to fight off another, another threat came and that swept him even further when he was forced to align himself with whatever it was that used to be that person he cared for only to be stabbed in the back and to see his soldiers and one of his new friends die. From that day, the ghost took control of him as anger and hate fueled him to avenge those that had died by her hand and to get even with the man who let her become what she was.

After four years of fighting ageist the man who was responsible for her fate with little success, he felt himself begin to fade away from the little amount of anything that could humanize him anymore. That was until the alien threat returned and he was swept up again into yet another war. Amidst the fighting, he managed to make the man he hated the most even more angry when he discredited him in public with bits of a recording of his conversations he had with him. It was one of the biggest steps in bringing him and his iron fist down. Raynor did find satisfaction in it. But he found no relief from the torment that still plagued his mind. That was until he found out that the things he was collecting to keep his crew and his ship afloat was actually the key to silence that ghost once and for all. After fighting his way through the fortress of the most hated person in the galaxy, they used the device that was the key to saving humanity from the greatest threat they had faced. When they explored the aftermath, he felt the pain lift away with him when he saw the person he remembered from so long ago lying before him. But before anything else could happen, he was put on the spot to sacrifice one last thing from his old life that came back and ended up betraying him. He blocked the shot and put the one bullet that was meant for the man he hated more than anything between the eyes of his old friend to save her.

What followed was anything but a happy reunion. After barley escaping from the hostile world, they were met by the man he hated who was hunting for the precious cargo they brought back from hell. When they thought they found refuge, they were betrayed again by the man who was behind the collecting of the artifact that restored her. They escaped but not without scares and unsettling realizations. They finally found true refuge at a secret location owned by the kindest of the three factions in this corner of the galaxy. There they stayed until they were ready to leave and continue what Raynor had begun after that infamous day. But they still tracked him down and they came again. In the end, he drew the short straw and was taken away.

When he saw her come into the cell, he felt as if everything had turned against him. It was as if the ghost had returned and inflicted more pain it ever made on him when it mocked him with devilish laughter. Everything he worked for, the loss of trust of his crew, risking their lives for something that can be seen as only a personal vendetta, it was all in vain.

But some part of him told him that he shouldn't be surprised with what he saw. One reason came when they were on the run. She had a hard time believing she was "saved." She told him it was her fault entirely; that the horrific creature was actually her and she caused the pain of millions. But he persisted. Again and again he told her, "That wasn't you, that was the Queen of Blades." But she always told him, "How do you know if it wasn't me?" The second reason came as the running came to a stop when he saw the rage that existed inside her. It was the rage that he had four years ago for the same man but her rage burned even more than his. He understood her rage; having to live with it for four years and having almost no way of getting rid of it. His hatred still burned for the man who betrayed them both and caused so much pain to billions of people. But that fire burned lower because he knew that he had to keep the rage against the tyrant under control if he was to keep himself and the women he moved heaven and earth to bring back alive.

When he wasn't coming back for her, he knew that the thirst for blood would probably consume her into inflicting so much pain on the Dominion. But what he didn't expect was for her to go back to what he went through hell and back and through hell again to bring her back.

Raynor began to doubt if there was anything human left in her when he saw that she deliberately chose to throw it all away on her free will. Maybe she was right that it was really her in the driver's seat when she sent out her minors to kill billions. That was what the ghost whispered in his ear when he first saw her.

But why did she show signs that she still loved him? Why did she go out of her league to save him when she could have just go and gather her minions again to slaughter millions more?

When she handed him his gun, she told him about the promise he made years ago to kill the monster that she was. She gave him that chance to fulfill it when she brought in up to her head.

At that moment, he heard the ghost that returned to him shout in his ear to pull the trigger for all the pain she caused in the past and for betraying him as a person. The anger and hatred weighed heavily on his finger as he pushed down on the trigger. But for some reason, he allowed himself to move the gun away and discharge all the rounds into the wall.

Why? Was it because some part of him still believed in her when she asked him before putting her life in her hands? He doubted it. If it wasn't that, it must have been what his Protoss friend said about her and the end of the universe.

_She dies, we all die._

He saw the vision of Armageddon through the Ihan crystal. He knew he could not let anger get the better of him after seeing what he saw. But whatever the reason, he was still upset and crushed after he lowered the gun after he unloaded it.

"I love you Jim... never forget it," was all she said before he walked out and returned to his ship.

Raynor moved his hands from his eyes and moved weaved his fingers together in front of his lips as he sighed deeply. The sigh wasn't from what he thought about the day before when he was rescued, not entirely at least. His mind was swimming with the thoughts he had about the dream he had when he collapsed.

The dream began when he and Sarah were fighting their way through the Umojan labs all the way to where the Archangel separated them in the fire fight. The steps played out just as it did but when he told Nova to take her best shot when she confronted him, everything went black. What happened next was unclear but he remembered what he saw.

When he heard the whisper that Sarah was still alive after her betrayal all those years ago, he saw images of a fiery planet inhabited by nightmarish creatures swarming around an object that contained a figure that looked human and he heard a voice call his name. It was Sarah sending out a call for help to him when she was incubated inside the Chrysalis.

He realized that what he dreamed about just now was what Sarah was showing him all the way on her monstrous Zerg ship. She was contacting him psyonicly again. He assumed that Kerrigan would think that he would be too angry at her to think about sending him a psyonic vision into his head. But if she knew he was angry and she went into his head, she wanted to show him what she wanted him to see very badly.

In his dream, he saw Kerrigan fly his drop ship to the rendezvous point where the Hyperion and the rest of the rebel fleet were waiting. He saw her burst into rage when she heard that Raynor never made it and grabbing a hold of Valerian's throat with her mind. He saw her get back to the drop ship and leave just as the rebel fleet escaped the Dominion ambush. He saw her make contact with a Zerg hive cluster and assembled the minions as they assaulted the Dominion base and destroyed the orbital cannon that was a threat to him coming to the rendezvous. Afterword, he saw Kerrigan sit at the console and speak into the microphone trying to contact him.

"Jim? Are you on this frequency? Jim, are you out there? I'm at the rendezvous, it's all clear here. I've been thinking about what you said. There's something dark in me Jim. I need you. I need you to hear me right now."

Jim felt a cold rush of loneliness and desperation surge through him when he saw Sarah speak. He saw her point her gun at the Zergling that came aboard and then a familiar voice on the spoke through the speakers.

"We interrupt you regularly scheduled programming to bring you this news: notorious rebel Jim Raynor was captured in a daring raid yesterday. He was briefly interrogated and snarly executed."

What followed was an over flowing rush of pain, anger, sadness and helplessness as she screamed and the entire ship shook and the lights and systems flickered. He saw her curl on the floor and shed a tear from her eye. It was an experience that was all-too-familiar to him. The Zergling approached her and when she looked at the creature, she listened to Mengsk's voice echo in the ship emphasizing the glory of the Dominion now that the greatest threats to humanity where finally dealt with. The sadness slowly turned into something that was also too familiar to Raynor. What other option was there when everything that you kept close to yourself was taken away? Raynor had an idea before he saw Kerrigan set the coordinates into the computer and fly the ship away.

What he saw happened next was what Jim could only describe as a montage of memories. Raynor sat there on the side of his bed still staring into the nothingness of his thoughts of what Kerrigan had showed him.

The way she reacted to the newscast made Raynor think about what he tried so hard to tell Sarah before they were separated. He wanted her so badly not to throw away all of his efforts to make her human again. But there was some part of him, perhaps it was the ghost that he though he got rid of was still whispering to him from a far and slowly filling him with doubt. That part of him had a feeling that she would do the unthinkable and deliberately go back to the swarm. That started to make him think that she was right that she was in the driver's seat ever since she emerged from the Chrysalis four years ago up to point where he freed her.

It felt even more so when he saw the scenes where she murdered a whole colony of Protoss on a remote ice planet similar to Braxis. The reason she went there was to reclaim Zerg that were under the control of a controlling Zerg called a Broodmother.

When she arrived, the Broodmother was dead and the Protoss saw her. If they told the rest of the Protoss, they'd exploit her weakness and have their fleets hunt her down. So, the way to keep that from happening was to silence all the voices so that the dead men tell no tales.

The way that she acted when she cut off their communications and how she even used a prisoner as a Trojan horse to catch those who did manage to get off planet made his ghost shout loader in his mind and pull him deeper into despair. The prisoner, who was called Lasarra, told her that she could just run with the Protoss hard on her trail. But, Kerrigan chose not to. For the sake of getting everything together to bring Mengsk to his knees, she had to butcher every single life including innocent lives, on an entire planet. That angered Raynor even more. Not even seeing Kerrigan tell her Zerg adjutant that she doesn't have to enjoy kill when she had to could justify anything.

The next battle happened on Char. After seeing her dual with a Broodmother and getting her and her Zerg to join Kerrigan's army, she set her forces loose against Warfield's men and completely destroyed the fighting machine.

Amidst the gun and cannon fire and the shredding of metal and flesh, Warfield's voice echoed:

"Damn it girl, we saved you! How could you return to this?

"You gave up your humanity for this; to kill more people?"

When the fighting ceased, he saw Kerrigan staring down at an impaled and crippled General inside the operations center littered with bodies of marines deceased in their CMC armor.

"Kerrigan," He said with the strength he had left. "You listen to me. I have three shuttles filled with men too injured to ever be a threat to you. Husbands...fathers...you let those shuttle's go, you hear me?!"

Kerrigan showed little signs that she heeded any of Warfield's words.

"You bitch; you're not even human anymore. You betrayed us all. For what? Petty revenge?!" Warfield weakly raised his robotic arm cannon and aimed it at her. "How many innocents have you killed?! How many more have to die?! What if Raynor could see you right now?!"

The rage in her eyes burned as they glowed orange and the area between them shook as she drove the steel beam strait down into Warfield's torso. Warfield then closed his eyes and his cannon fell beside him. After the rage subsided in Kerrigan's eyes, she took a pause and closed her eyes. She tilted her head up and reopened them as she turned and walked away from the expired old soldier. In the last moments, Raynor herd the voices of the Dominion officers on the radio saying the Zerg that pursued them were falling back and they were going to make it out alive.

It was hard to take in that she spared those Dominion soldiers, who were a part of the thing whose leader was who she hated the most. Then again, Raynor was a part of the Confederate army when he was a Heaven's Devil. When he learned that the war he was fighting was only to fill the Old Family's pockets, he went AWOL after seeing his unit fall to the Confederate military. The soldiers weren't the evil one's inherently, it was the person sitting on the throne that was. But she still spared them while she killed a planet of Protoss whom she didn't hate as much.

What happened next was unexpected. Zeratul appeared in her ship and, after a bitter greeting from Kerrigan, gave her a vision of Zerus, the birth world of the Zerg.

When Raynor looked into the Ihian Crystal, he saw Tassadar, who wasn't as dead as he, Zeratul and the rest of the witnesses of his magic track on Auir thought, said that the Overmind was created by a Xel'naga and altered the Zerg into weapons. This Zerus planet must have been where it started and those primal Zerg he saw in the vision that Kerrigan received from Zeratul were what they were before they became the ravenous killing machines that he was all-too-familiar with.

Kerrigan and her crew of Zerg arrived and Zeratul was there waiting for her.

"The power of Zerus called you here." Zeratul said when she walked up to him on the planet's surface.

"My need to see Mengsk dead called me here." She retorted. "These Zerg will help me destroy Korhal."

"You must let remake you, Kerrigan! The final war nears, and there is little time."

"I don't need to do a damn thing. I will not be a pawn in your prophecies."

"But you will do anything to have your revenge?"

"Anything."

"Then that is enough,"

What followed was a frenzy of blood as the native creatures battled Kerrigan and her brood as she set out to clam the power of Zerus. He saw her awaken the large primal Zerg creature that was referred to as the Ancient one whom spoke to her about her desire to clam the power of the planet. After the ancient one told her what to do, she entered the center of the pool and encased herself into something that Raynor never wished to see again; another Chrysalis. When she emerged, she took on her infamous form again and showed even more power than what he saw when she emerged the first time on Char.

Afterword, she told her Zerg crew and the Ancient one, Zerven, that she felt even more power than she had before when she was the old Queen of blades. She also mentioned that she recalled an influence on her from Amon, the Dark One Raynor had seen in the Overmind's vision, and the Xel'naga artifact removed it. At first, Raynor felt relief that he was right that the thing Sarah was before wasn't entirely her. But the way she embraced her new powers as she set out and killed the rest of the Primal pack leaders and collected their essence and their packs, including Zervan who turned on her, Raynor began to think that it didn't matter whether she was Amon's puppet or not.

But when she seemed to have all the reason to march straight to Korhal and start the body count that would end with Mengsk's on top, she was looking down at a two-way communicator that was brought to her by her swarm when thousands were said to have been released to Char. The holographic image of Mengsk's head then appeared.

"The Queen of Blades. I knew you'd return to your true form; a monster." Mengsk said. Kerrigan rolled her eyes slightly and her vision drifted to the side.

"Now you'll do exactly as I say if you care at all about Jim Raynor."

When she heard his name, her eyes widened and shot directly to Mengsk's image.

"Yes…" Mengsk said with a sadistic tone, "He's alive. So you will keep your swarm away from Korhal, and away from me, or he dies."

He grinned as he began to mock her. "That man sacrificed everything to give you back your humanity. And you threw it away. How he must be disgusted by you. Why, he'd be the first in line to kill you." Then the communicator went dark.

Jim didn't need to feel Kerrigan's emotion she project through the vision to see what she felt.

When the leviathan departed and warped back to Koprulu, Kerrigan was told that something that was Zerg but not of her brood was contacting her from afar.

"I know you wish to topple Mengsk. His alien soldiers, the hybrid, are your greatest threat." The voice said to her, "If you wish to stop them, meet me at these coordinates."

The Hybrids. Jim remembered infiltrating the Dominion bio-weapons lab at Castinar and seeing the specimens and escaping from the hybrid that rampaged free from its cell when he and his men took out the reactor to blow it all sky high.

Kerrigan knew that Jim was out there somewhere and she needed to find him but the threat of the Hybrids was something she couldn't ignore. She followed the trail the mysterious voice left for her to an orbital platform called Skygeirr Station.

There, the speaker of the voice revealed himself.

_Stukov?_ Raynor was surprised again.

Whatever the reason he ended up the way he did, Stukov told Kerrigan about the lab and how it contained more Hybrid. Raynor saw glimpses of the battle on the station platform; how she infested the garrisons and used those soldiers as cannon fodder to clear out the platform and break through the front door. Inside, he saw the Hybrids in the holding chambers and Kerrigan moved quickly to eradicate them before they could kill her.

Before they descended deeper into the station, Stukov explained that Dr. Emil Narud was at the head of all it. That wasn't surprising to Jim, considering how Naurd betrayed him and his Raiders when they ran from the Dominion and nearly trapped them at the secret research facility in the Kirkegaard Belt. That was until Stukov told her that Naurd wasn't really human; he was a thousand year old shape shifter who had major ties to Amon whom Narud was trying to resurrect somehow. When Kerrigan and Stukov discussed how Narud was doing this, Kerrigan realized why Narud was behind the findings of the artifact pieces and what really happened when Raynor blasted her with it.

_Son of a bitch_

That whole time when Raynor was collecting the pieces was all a deceptive plot to release Kerrigan's psyonic energy to have it given to Amon. It was the perfect plan; Tychus's itch for freedom combined with Mengsk's rage to see Kerrigan dead and Raynor's own desperation to make her human again was the perfect set up.

He saw Kerrigan and Stukov descend deeper into the lab to find an ancient Xel'naga Cavern populated by Tal'darim Protoss. There, Narud showed his true form to her as he and his fanatical followers battled her and her brood. But Kerrigan was too powerful for the fanatics as her brood tore every Tal'darim to shreds and Narud retreated deeper into the cavern. Kerrigan followed him. She entered a dark room as the large door opened. Inside was a temple interior with spires reaching out from the ground.

"Face me Narud," she spoke into the darkness of the chamber, "it's over."

"It is only beginning," Narud's voice echoed in the darkness. "Amon whispered of this from the stars. He told you of his return. He told you of ruin…extinction...the end of all things."

Kerrigan looked around seeing shadows shift in the corners of her eyes. "Your god is dead and he is never coming back!"

"Is that what you think?"

She whipped her body around and swung her bladed wing tip where she heard the voice. She froze and stopped her blade where it was when she saw who spoke.

"No," She hesitated and stepped back. Her eyes were filled with shock at the sight of Jim Raynor standing in front of her. But then his eyes glowed red and he looked up. From above, a fragment of the Xel'naga structure fell like a falling chandler and landed where Sarah was standing. But the fragment glowed and sizzled with energy and disintegrated. Sarah was crouched down panting and supporting herself with her wings.

"No," she slowly looked up at the shape shifter, "You're not him."

Energy surged around her as she unleashed it through the ground toward Narud. He was launched off his feet and he flew up and landed into the side of the crystal segment of the main spire in the center of the room. She ran toward the spire and from the ground began to crumble bellow her feet. A Nydus worm emerged skimming the surface and she leapt on top of it as it stretched out of the ground with its mandibles heading straight up toward Narud. The worm's mouth collided and broke through the pillar. Then an orange glow grew inside the worm's mouth and then an explosion erupted inside. Narud shot out of the worm's mouth and slammed down onto the floor. Just as the Nydus worm fell in its own demise, Kerrigan slammed on top of Narud and began delivering punches onto the shape shifter's head.

"You are not Jim!" Sarah shouted with anger as she slammed her fists again and again into Raynor's face. "You are nothing!"

When the last punch connected, Raynor's face changed into something that was even more haunting.

"I am everything you lost." Kerrigan looked down at a redheaded ghost that she had though she all but forgotten. The Queen of Blades hesitated again and Narud made his move. In the form of Kerrigan before she was taken by the Zerg, Narud shot his hand up and forced Kerrigan off her feet and suspended her in the air. He was on his feet and he swiftly pulled his fist back which suddenly emanated with an orange Psi-blade and shot it into Kerrigan's abdomen. Kerrigan's eyes widened when she felt the breath from her body forced out of her and the pain shot to every corner of her body. She looked at her former self who looked back at her with a mocking stare.

"I am everything you never had."

With what energy she had left, the Queen of Blades forced herself down and wrapped her arms around Narud. From behind her, Kerrigan's wings glowed violet and she forced them behind Narud and put all six razor sharp tips through the back of Naurd's body. The shape shifter's body shuttered and he groaned with pain.

"You already lost," Kerrigan's own voice whispered into her ear. As Naurd's strength failed, his voice slipped into the dark whisper of his unnatural tone. "Amon lives, you will see him soon."

The blade came out of the Queen of Blades' body as Narud fell down to the floor dead but retaining the redheaded Ghost's form. Kerrigan fell down next to the shape shifter and lay curled on the floor as her strength and her consciousness faded away into darkness.

Kerrigan found herself inside a pool and the voices of her brood communicated with her. They told her they managed to get her out and put her into the pit to heal. She'd barely escaped death. As she rested and her body put itself back together, all she could think about were what she had seen when she dueled Narud. Seeing Jim again; the mixture of fear, guilt and even regret filled her. He was still in danger and he still didn't know what she had done to herself. And seeing her reflection of what she once was so long ago; she couldn't even comprehend the burden she had on herself.

When she was fully healed, she came to her companions who were waiting for her. She gave the order to leave the station and one thing was on her mind as the Leviathan warped out: Jim.

When the Leviathan came out of its warp, she reached out with her mind into the far reaches of Dominion space. She found the Hyperion's signal and she reached out to it.

Matt and Valerian received her call and they were initially surprised seeing her the way she was. She told them Raynor was alive and told them to hack the Dominion network to find him. The wait was long and tedious. While she waited, her Zerg minions bickered that they disliked working with the Terrans and slightly questioned Kerrigan's orders. But Kerrigan told them to shut up and deal with it. After waiting for hours, Valerian told Kerrigan Raynor was held on the Moros and they determined where they would intercept the prison ship. Matt suggested that they would let Tosh onto the ship to find him but Kerrigan hastily insisted she'd do it herself.

Alongside the Battle Cruiser, the lavation came out of warp before a large ship docked to a station. The creature extended its colossal tentacles and punched them into the bow of the ship. Kerrigan emerged inside of the ship and she began her march. She and her minions tore through the ship, section by section and level by level; impaling, shredding and even infesting all who got in her way. The ship then began to tear itself apart when she made it to the lift to the prison deck. She hurried through the cell blocks as the Moros collapsed section by section until she arrived at "Maximum Security." She told her Broodmother to have the Leviathan stabilize the ship. Its tentacle's torn through the hull and embedded into the steel structures; the section of the ship wasn't going to destroy itself now. She then proceeded into the corridor and took out the remaining guards inside. As she proceeded, she came across the contraband section. She went inside and found what she hoped to find, Raynor's revolver. She continued on until she turned her head to a cell door. She focused her psyonic energy and blew the door off its hinges into the cell. Just as she was about to enter, the image of her doing so began to darken until it became total blackness.

"I don't want you to forgive me. I only want you to know."

Those were the last words he heard before Jim found himself in his quarters again.

Raynor pondered everything that he saw for many long minutes before he closed his eyes and bent his head down to his knees.


	2. Part 2

Part 2

Raynor peered through the glass of the Hyperion's bridge. Korhal lay below him and his crew. From orbit, Korhal's city lights glowed in a mesmerizing pattern across. It was amazing how this planet could rebuild itself so quickly even after so many brutal beatings. The first beating happened a decade and a half ago when the Confederacy ruled supreme. The planet spoke out against the Confederate government for its heavy handed ruling. Angus Mengsk, who was Korhal's senator, made a bold statement to the Old Families that Korhal would go to war with the Confederacy if Korhal's demands for greater autonomy were not satisfied. But the only thing that the Mengsk family got out of it was three ghosts that put three bullets in between the eyes of Angus, his wife Katherine and their young daughter Dorothy. Arcturus then waged guerrilla warfare against the Confederate in name of his family. Then the Confederacy stepped it up with a nuclear holocaust on the entire planet. The once temperate and lush planet was turned into a nuclear wasteland and, when the material was cleaned up and the planet was re-terraformed, all that was left was a planet-wide desert. After the Confederacy fell, Arcturus designated Korhal as the throne world for his new empire and rebuilt the planet into an urban metropolis populated by billions.

The second beating for the planet came during the Brood War. When the United Earth Directorate arrived from earth, one of their goals was to claim the Terran worlds that the original Terrans aboard the prisoner ships that were sent off course settled on. They assaulted the Dominion out posts on Braxis first and then moved in on Korhal and lay siege to the city. The attack was brutal and costly but the UED managed to break through. Arcturus barely escaped with some unexpected help from Raynor and his Protoss friends. Once the UED settled in and eventually claimed the Zerg Overmind, the old Queen of Blades along with her unholy alliance of Terran's and Protoss assaulted Korhal and took back the planet from the UED. Arcturus got his planet back but that was after the Queen of Blades stabbed him and the rest of her temporary allies in the back.

Now after four years of reconstruction, Korhal seemed to be at its peak of greatness despite the scares that marked the planet. That was until a few hours ago. Now Korhal was facing another invasion by the Zerg. From his spot on the bridge, Raynor saw the Zerg advancement on the planet's surface around the massive capital Augustgrad. The city lights faded as the surface was replaced by creep that spread like a plague. From above the surface, he saw the other Leviathans hovering above the planet like a blockade on a quarantined world. No one was coming in the save the emperor and no one was getting out except the civilians that the new Queen of Blades allowed to leave.

Raynor did see some irony in all of this. At the end of the rebellion, right before Mengsk left Kerrigan to her fate, he set up the psi-emitters on Tarsonis to lure the Zerg to the planet and have them do all the fighting for him. Everything on planet, the corrupt government, its iron fist military and the innocent civilians was destroyed. Raynor didn't mind the government dying but using the monstrous creatures to do along with having them killing millions of civilians with no way of escape, that was far beyond anything that he would ever consider as acceptable. Now it seemed that the past has finally come back to deliver all the pain back to him. Because Raynor and his Raiders made their broadcast exposing Mengsk's biggest crime, the Terrans of the other worlds could see this as karma coming back to him. But what was different about this was that the civilians on the planet wouldn't be a part of the victims of the destruction.

Raynor still though about his dream he had from Kerrigan. How the anger burned inside her from that day she was left for dead and the day she thought she lost everything to start over. She wanted revenge so badly much like Arcturus wanted to avenge his planet when the Confederacy leveled it. But the difference was that Arcturus let loose with no mercy on anyone and had every living thing on the surface be killed. But right here right now, the person seeing this attack through allowed the innocent people to escape while the military men stayed to die protecting their corrupt Emperor.

After observing the scene for nearly an hour, he turned around and the scene. He propped himself next against the wall in the corner of the bridge next to the door.

After several minutes, the door next to him opened and Matt Horner walked through

"The north-east sector is clear." He said as he stepped toward Valerian.

"We are behind in the eastern corridor." Valerian looked at the screen emanating from the central consol. The image showed the over-orbit image of a section of the city. The streets were crowded with military encampments and with civilians filling the streets walking toward the evacuation zones where the starships were loading up to air lift them from the city and the planet. On the way to Korhal, Valerian set up a plan to send the evacuated civilians to temporary locations on Dominion fridge worlds not touched by the Zerg and Umojan worlds that agreed to house the refugees.

The screen suddenly surged and Kerrigan's image showed up.

"It's time Valerian." She said immediately. Raynor pushed himself off the wall and stood next to the door.

"The evacuation is still underway." Valerian retorted.

"I can't afford to hold back any longer." She said showing some impatience.

"Promise me you will avoid civilian centers."

"I can't do that. Arcturus would see that pattern in my movements and use it against me."

Valerian closed his eyes, "Then millions will die."

Raynor looked at Kerrigan's image as Valerian finished his statement. She closed her eyes. She displayed frustration and emotional conflict.

"Alright…" she said after the brief pause. "Stay out of my way, and I'll do what I can." The screen went dark.

When the screen dissipated back to the console, Matt and Valerian turned around. Their eyes stopped at Jim. Jim looked at them for a second before he bent his head down and closed his eyes and tightened his fists.

Raynor's life had always been about misfortunes. He tried to find a quiet and normal life after a life of betrayal and of crime. He had an opportunity when he married a beautiful girl and became marshal on a new colony world. His son was born and it seemed it could be possible to make his parents who passed on proud. But that hope was crushed when his son was taken away and was reported dead. His wife died blaming herself and Raynor was alone. After years of protecting the law, the aliens came and swept him into the war. He fought beside the rebels who sought to bring down the government that caused all of them so much pain.

There, he met Kerrigan whom he grew close to as he fought alongside her. Another hope grew in him to make his life happy again when they became closer but that hope was crushed again when she was betrayed by the leader of the rebellion who was the same scum as those he fought against.

But Jim heard a whisper of hope when he was lead to the planet of hell itself where he saw that Kerrigan was alive. But that hope was twisted when he saw that she became a monster that would later cause him even more grief as she betrayed him and the rest of her allies. After that day, he swore to kill her. But four years later, he saw another hope when he saw a way to bring Kerrigan back and he did just that. But now, the hope had been crushed a third time. What else was there to do when all he ever fought for was all in vain?

But then Raynor recalled his dream. Kerrigan showed him all she experienced when he was locked up until she broke him out. He saw everything, all the bad, ugly and even the unusual parts about her adventure. Ever since then, she hadn't received anything else from her, no dreams, no telepathic words or visions. What made Raynor curious was how she presented her memories to him. It was the entire story and nothing seemed to be censored or conceded. The dream wasn't given to him defend herself or justify any of her actions. It was like when a person would admit everything to their friend when they felt lost or just wanted it out of their system. But why would she give everything to him under the circumstances?

Raynor looked back at what the old Queen of Blades was and he looked at the girl that he saw in his dream. The girl before was headstrong, violent and had a desire to gain power at any cost while the one right now shared so much that the old one did. But there was something different about her now even though she shared so much with her old self.

He remembered his father's words in his recording before he died:

_Do you remember what I used to tell you, Son? A man is what he chooses to be. It's not how he's born, or how he's raised, that makes the man. It's his choices._

_A man can turn his life around with a single thought, a single decision. You can always choose to be something new. Never forget that._

Every person's life was created by the choices they made. Some people made choices for good but many made choices for bad. And sometimes choices that were thought to be good turned out or ended up being bad. He made bad choices when he was young; he made mistakes. But in the end, he chose to get out of the mistake he made and started over. But that ended badly the first time, then the second, then the third.

And yet he didn't choose to go bad again. Why?

It was because he believed to be the better man. He kept choosing to keep his ideals no matter the consequences. But why did it have to hurt him so much to be a good man?

Life was never perfect and a happy life wouldn't come easy. It was like war; you won't win every battle and for the ones you do win, you would never win the war you fought without casualties.

Raynor failed so many times in his life but every time he did, he got back up and tried again.

But what about Kerrigan? Most of her life was chosen for her. The Confederacy took her and made her their weapon and used her in their experiments with the Zerg. When she was liberated by Mengsk, she chose to fight alongside him until he left her for dead. When she was taken by the Overmind, Amon influenced her to do the terrible things she did. Now, with the influence gone, she chose to go back to the Swarm with her own mind controlling it.

When Jim thought about it, he and Sarah were similar. They both had been in situations where they were seen as bad. For Jim, he was able to choose to change himself. When he was given the opportunity, he got his slate clean and was given a chance to start over.

But for Sarah, it seemed her choices were harder and it made it even harder for her to choose to go back. It wasn't like she could just choose to walk away from the Swarm and get that carapace skin off of her. She sacrificed everything when she entered the chrysalis again, her humanity, her identity and even the man she loved to have her revenge.

_Hold on!_

Why did he believe she gave up her humanity? What was it to be human? Raynor made himself believe that it wasn't appearances that made a person human. In fact, to him, the Protoss seemed to be more "human" than most Terrans he knew or faced. So why did he believe Kerrigan wasn't human anymore?

She had chosen to kill every single Protoss on a planet but on Char she chose to spare wounded marines and now she was choosing to allow civilians to escape which made it harder for her to get to Mengsk. Why would she do that if she wouldn't be accepted by humanity anytime soon?

Arcturus said to Kerrigan that she threw away here humanity. That might have been true. But there was one thing that Arcturus was wrong about. She might have given up her humanity, but she could still choose to be human. Being human was a choice just like his father said.

Though she couldn't chose to get out of what she had gotten herself into, she could still chose to use her powers and use her Swarm for her own purposes. Maybe that was what she was doing with the Zerg. Amon made them into weapons millennia ago and the Overmind set out under Amon's influence to destroy many worlds. But the Overmind tried to find a way to free his Zerg by creating the Queen of Blades. But his plan fell short when Amon's influence passed on to Sarah and made her the proclaimed "Queen bitch of the universe."

But Amon must have believed that the Queen of Blades was still a flaw in his plan. That must have been why his servant Narud set out to find a willing group to collect the artifacts to pacify the Queen and to take away her energy to reawaken his master and the Swarm that she built up for him to take. That group did so and the Queen was left venerable and ready to be taken out to let the rest of the plan unfold without any more setbacks. But there was a flaw in that plan.

_You will hold her life in your hands._

By blocking the executioner's shot, Raynor had kept the greatest threat to Amon alive.

At first, Kerrigan didn't want to take any part in this prophecy that Zeratul told him and her about. But after seeing her battle Narud at Skygeirr Station, she seemed to accept that she did have a role in the prophecy and she was choosing to play in it.

But what about Raynor? Did he mean anything to her now?

Then it dawned on Raynor. From what he saw in his dream and seeing what was happening now, he had a feeling that Kerrigan was the one that believed in him. When Mengsk falls, humanity would choose its fate again and it was like, without recognizing it, she was putting humanity's fate in the hands of people like him. It was like she was admitting he was the better person. Maybe this invasion wasn't only for revenge anymore. Maybe it was the first priority in things to come.

But from the dream, she seemed to not care if he believed in her anymore. If Raynor truly believed in his father's words, then he truly believed in redemption. Kerrigan might not have been able to redeemer herself yet, but Raynor had a feeling that she might be able to in the future. But in order for her to do that she needed something to make her believe she could.

Maybe Jim did have a role to play in this prophecy. He remembered what the old Queen of Blades said in Zertaul's Ihan Crystal:

_Fate cannot be changed. The end comes. And when it finds me... I shall embrace it at last._

But when Raynor protected her when he lifted Amon's influence, he might have given her a reason to fight the inevitable with a sense that she could win. But maybe she didn't know that yet and she needed to see it. Things might not be the same between them or go like they wanted it to be. But like any other failure, you take what you have left and what is given to you and you get right back up and try again. And right now, the first thing to do was to take out the tyrant that sat on his throne down on that planet.

Jim composed himself and opened his eyes. He didn't know if he'd been pondering for hours or only minutes with the two men in front of him staring at him the whole time. Jim looked over at Matt. The captain read the commander's face and he knew what it meant. Without a word, Matt gave the commander a gentle nod. Valerian turned his head to Horner and Matt gave another nod to him.

The two men walked passed Raynor toward the door off the bridge. Valerian stopped beside Raynor. He put his hand on Jim's shoulder and looked into his eyes. From the look Valerian gave him, Jim accepted it as a silent "Good luck."

When Valerian walked out of the room and the door closed behind him, Raynor walked over to the communicator consol.

"Attention all hands, this is Raynor," Raynor spoke on the intercom through the consol, "Several months ago we descended into hell to pacify the Zerg and to hopefully redeem their leader. But many of you might think it might have all been for nothing; you can see that the Queen is back on her throne and her servants still serve her."

Raynor took a pause. "I can't say that our efforts have given all of us what we expected, but in a way, it's given us something we've wanted to have ever since we came together four years ago. Ever since Mengsk destroyed Tarsonis along with the innocent souls on it and played king maker, we wanted to see him fall from his throne and pay for his crimes. Well I can tell you that that day is here and I know that many of you won't want to sit on the sidelines and just watch it happen."

Raynor smiled. "Besides, the lady who made this day possible saved me and she fought our entire war for us. I figure we should give her a little thank you for her hard work. Get aggressive raiders, because we're bringing our fight into her war."


	3. Part 3

Part 3

"Kerrigan, the die is cast." Mengsk's voice echoed through the streets. "This is the last day your Swarm darkens the sky of any planet. Korhal will endure, as will I."

"Nice quote. I'll engrave it on your tombstone." Kerrigan spoke out to Mengsk as she walked with her forces walking close behind her. After hours of pushing into the city and shattering the sky, Kerrigan had finally made it to the imperial district of Augustgrad. While her Broodmothers launched their Swarm to all the different locations and cities on Korhal to keep the full Dominion military divided and at bay, Kerrigan, Zagara, Stukov and Dehaka took their broods and packs to the outskirts of the capital city of Augustgrad.

After landing on the surface, Kerrigan organized her brood and planted bile launchers to destroy the orbital defenses to allow the rest of her brood to land onto the planet and amass together and push into the city. Block-by-block, mile-by-mile, the Zerg advanced and tore through the streets where the Dominion forces set up to halt them but all that did was slow some advancing broods down while others almost did nothing. And all that was left of the city the Zerg advanced through was mangled steal, fires set to the buildings and streets covered with creep and littered with bodies of Zerg and Dominion soldiers.

When they were within a mile of the imperial sector, the area where Mengsk's mile-high pyramid palace stood, the Psi-destroyer was activated on the orbital platform above and sent Kerrigan's brood into disarray and caused serious damage to her forces. The Dominion had an advantage to push Kerrigan's forces back. Reacting quickly, the Kerrigan sent a diversionary attack to lure the dominion away and moved in toward the platform with Dehaka and his pack. Because the Primal Zerg had no Hive mind, they were immune to the effects of the destroyer. With Dehaka's help, Kerrigan destroyed the device. Without anything else impeding the Zerg's path, she returned to the surface and drove the dominion counterattack away and set her sights toward the Imperil sector.

The sector was surrounded with a barricade that covered all the avenues that lead to it. The swarm moved in and formed a horseshoe formation around the district but they had little success breaking through the lines. With the strength of her brood, Kerrigan managed to break through the defenses at the southernmost entrance. The troops were driven back and Kerrigan's brood moved in and set up their base at the southern tip.

The Imperial sector was several miles wide and filled with government buildings, high and middle class luxury apartments and mansions, countless parks and statuaries featuring Mengsk and the Mengsk family and many corporate centers that ran the economy of the Dominion. And at the center was the mighty imperial Palace that stood above all the rest as the signal of the power of the emperor of the mighty Dominion. It was ironic because after today, that palace would become nothing more than a symbol of shame to the eyes of the people who would see the inevitable end of a power hungry tyrant.

The entire district was fortified into one large fortress. Bunkers, missile turrets and siege tanks covered the streets, the avenues and bridges. Countless troops fortified crumbling buildings and vehicles and more infantry patrolled every street. Up above, several Battle Cursers hovered over the district while others patrolled up north to keep the Zerg up there from moving in. They were accompanied by patrolling aircraft while the rest of the air force were on the ground ready to take off at a moment's notice from the permanent military bases set up throughout the sector as well as other encampments set u in the parks and leveled residential areas.

It would be a tough fight, Kerrigan had to admit, but in the end, Mengsk would be dead no matter what.

"You never should have come back to Korhal." Mengsk's voice spoke out over the streets again. "You are surrounded by the Dominion's elite."

"And yet they still won't be enough to save you," she replied. "How many bodies will you hide behind?"

"I've had enough of your tongue," Mengsk abruptly fired back. "Men, wipe them out!"

_And so it begins._ Sarah grinned to herself.

Her swarm flowed in from the southern avenue while several nydus worms popped up and supplied more troops at her location quickly and effectively. The Zerg were numberless even with the countless casualties they suffered in battle not to mention that they could create more forces on the fly now that she had established a hive cluster at the southern tip. But they couldn't be careless. Like what Kerrigan taught Zegarra on Char, to win this battle, they needed to have vision. If the Dominion troops managed to exploit a hole in the Zerg line, then they could be pushed back and they would lose precious ground.

To win, Kerrigan would have to assault the roads constantly to deal efficient damage to the enemy and progress slowly along the roads up to the palace. When they would gain ground and take out key locations like a military base or encampment, she would establish another hive cluster at those points to spawn fresh troops and have more nydus worms insert troops at those locations.

Right now, since her flow of reinforcements was low and concentrated in one location, she would have to play it safe and concentrate on few approaches at a time but should also be ready to retaliate against an attack that might come at a lightly guarded location. Now that they were in the most heavily guarded place in Terran space, Mengsk was sure to have sent in an attack to plug the hole in the southern sector. She amassed her forces together as the hive's structures begun to take form.

She first sent thin groups of Zerglings to the north, east and southern directions. The ones to the east encountered a barricade on the street with siege tanks and bunkers. They retreated when they drew their fire and burrowed to give an early warning system if an attack was coming from the east. The one sent to the north encountered the same thing and burrowed out of sight. The one to the west encountered an oncoming strike force of marines and marauders. The Raptors dealt as much damage as they could before they expired under their fire.

The strike force was rather small so Kerrigan decided she'd take care of them herself. As she moved down the eastern pass, several of her Zerg forces dispersed to the north and west to assault the barricades and gain ground. She encountered the strike team and moved in. They barred their weapons at her when they were in range but Kerrigan moved too quickly to allow them a decent shot. She shifted right through the formation of troopers. When she came out of her dash, all the marines were left cut in half. The Marauders that survived her slicing attack turned to unleash their punisher grenades. But Kerrigan lifted two of them off the ground and threw them into the two remaining marauders and the rest of the grenades in the thrown Marauders' ammo holders exploded.

With the strike force taken care of she ordered a dispatch of her awaiting troops to accompany her to push on to the east. With Kerrigan's support, the barricades were cleared with very little resistance and casualties. The barricades to the north and west were falling gradually to the Zerg too.

The eastern road led to a metro rail station that stood next to military base which contained a star port. In the parking lot of the station, several siege tanks and bunkers took position while several more troops fortified the station itself in a flanking position for oncoming hostiles. Kerrigan marched with her brood and assaulted the parking lot.

Meanwhile, several of her Raptors had broken off and ran down the metro rail tracks toward the rear of the station. When they arrived they swarmed in and took out the troops fortified inside. They soon emerged through the entrance and flanked the parking lot emplacement.

Reinforcements were coming in via drop ship but Kerrigan and her mutalisks shot down most of them before they could drop off their passengers. Those that did were disposed of quickly as well as their passengers who barely got off a shot.

With the station theirs, a Nydus worm popped up and supplied her with more reinforcements. They now set their sights on the base that lay next to the metro station.

She first brought in her carrion Strain Swarm hosts and they burrowed just out of gun range. They spawned their locusts that flew toward the defenses while her brood followed close behind. The Dominion troops came to the gate and defended against the attackers. But what they didn't know was that the initial attack she was only a diversion. Below, Infesters swam through the ground under the Dominion troops' feet.

When they made it to the central buildings and the Starport, the infesters emerged. Before the troopers had realized they were tricked, vireo phages had already emerged. Newly infested Terrans poured out and attacked the base's forces from behind. Once Kerrigan's forces broke through, she met up with her new minions.

"Your defenses could use some work Arcturus." Kerrigan said to the emperor.

"You'll pay for that." Mensgk's voice replied.

Just as they had begun to establish a new hive in the infested base the dominion replied with another assault force. This time, a detachment of hellions and reapers zoomed in from the northwest while a group of Warhounds and goliaths came from the northern streets.

The hellions and reapers burned through oncoming Zerglings but the infesters unleashed a fungal growth on them rendering them immobile. Corpser roaches came in and melted away the light reapers and their Roachlings emerged from their dissolved corpses to aid them.

While the light attackers were being torn apart, Kerrigan leapt up to the oncoming trio of Warhounds. She came down on the lead Warhound, and slammed on top of the cockpit. She broke through the glass and sent her wing tip into the heart of the pilot. With it disabled, she leapt backward and telekinetically launched the machine backward and collided with the Warhound behind it. The remaining Warhound locked its sights on her and unleashed a salvo of missiles. She ran and dogged the missiles as best she could. When she closed the distance, she slashed her wings into the machine. It collapsed to the ground a few slashes later. The goliaths that followed were dealt with when several impalers had arrived and burrowed crippled walkers and the rest of the assaulting swarm finished them off.

This part of the sector was now the Swarm's. Nydus worms popped up and supplied the position with more troops. The Hatchery finished it's mutations amongst the infested structures. Among the vacant vehicles they grabbed, five Vikings, four banshees and six sieges tanks were intact and ready to be used by their infested pilots.

Kerrigan sensed that the battle to the west and north of the primary hive cluster were beginning to faultier. To the west another strike team was coming in packing a powerful punch. Kerrigan went to the nearest Nydus worm.

She emerged out one of the worms at the Primary hive cluster. She arrived just as the strike force of Vikings and elite marine infantry came in with the assistance of two Thors. They rattled the bases defenses a bit before Kerrigan confronted the group. Immediately she unleashed a crushing grip onto the squad of marines and kinetically blasted one of the Thors weakening the metal behemoth. Just then, a large group of Raptor Zerglings were both reconstituted and freshly spawned at the hive cluster. They were also accompanied by three vipers and an Ultralisk. The Vikings' Gatling guns and Thors' cannons did thin the Zerglings a bit but with the assistance of the vipers' blinding clouds they put on the troops, the strike force was torn asunder shortly afterward.

Now it was time to gain ground on the western side. When more of her brood came to join her, they set out down the Western boulevard. They trampled through the barricades the dominion tried to reestablish after they drove the Zerg back. They came to large encampment at the corner of the street but they had little trouble trampling through it with Kerrigan's assistance. Up north where the corner lead to, another Dominion base lay next to an overpass that the road lead to. They advanced but when they got closer, siege tanks came into view all lined up on the overpass pointing their guns at her. Their cannons blew through her brood. To make matters worse a flight of banshees swooped in and started to bombard the brood on the street. Kerrigan knew they were in trouble as her attack was being thinned greatly in the open and seeing another strike force of Marines, Marauders and Goliaths coming down to take her on. It wasn't like them to retreat but they wouldn't be able to break through the strike force with enough numbers to get to the base and take it with the constant bombardment from the banshees and tanks.

She was about to order the retreat when she suddenly stopped. Something in her head just suddenly sparked. She could sense something that was coming down from the sky.

"No…" She whispered to herself as she looked up. "It can't be."

"My queen," Izsha communicated to her. "A Terran Battle Cruiser is inbound on your location."

And sure enough, a Battlecruiser emerged from the cloud cover. When the ship stabilized over the base, an electric field dispersed around the ship and the nearby mechanical units, including the siege tanks, were disrupted. The Battlecruiser's laser batteries then opened up and airships dispersed from it. Banshees swooped in and unlashed volleys of their missiles onto the tanks without having to worry about the disabled missile turrets. A flight of Vikings swooped in and downed the Dominion banshees with their Lanzer torpedoes. They turned around and changed into walker mode inside the base just as drop pods that launched from the battle curser landed. The soldiers emerged and started shooting. The anti-air defenses and siege tanks were removed quickly.

Reacting to the sudden attack, Kerrigan moved her group of Zerg up the road toward the strike team on coming strike team. Kerrigan jogged up passed the troopers who were engaged her forces toward the Goliaths. She leapt onto the lead goliath a punched right through the cockpit's glass and through the head of pilot. She leapt off the lead walker and landed in front of the next one. She sliced through the walkers' left leg with her wing and it slammed down sideways. Two were down and six were left. As her brood came to assist her after they took care of the infantry, she unleashed a kinetic blast into the cockpit of another goliath. She grasped the severed leg of the previous walker and threw it hard at another. The leg punched right through the cockpit and into the pilot. The rest of the Goliaths fell as the brood moved in.

Kerrigan continued up to the base. It was cleaned out by the time she arrived. Many of the troops that deployed from above positioned themselves around the perimeter. The marines saw her approach and they signaled each other to hold their fire while Kerrigan influenced her brood to not attack them. From above, drop ships landed around the zone while the Battle Cruiser continued to descend on a landing vector. One of the drop ships flew down toward her. Sarah recognized that it was the ship she took when she escaped from the Umojan lab. When it set down, the bay door opened and the troops filed out. All, except one. The soldier in black armor, with a familiar skull faceplate, walked down the ramp and stopped in front of Sarah.

* * *

"Jim?"

The suit's faceplate lifted and Raynor's face emerged baring a light smile.

"Let's finish the job." He said.

Right at that moment, Kerrigan was totally unprepared.

Ever since the day she returned to the swarm after receiving the false news that the only thing that mattered to her was gone forever, she felt nothing more than a weapon; a weapon that had been controlled by the Confederacy, Mengsk, and the Overmind. If that was all she ever was, then she'd be that weapon and deal damage to the one thing that she hated the most. Nothing else mattered to her. She didn't belong anywhere anymore. She was a monster.

At least that was what she thought.

When the news came to her that Jim was alive, some part of her wasn't surprised even though she felt crushed knowing what was going to happen when Jim would see her as she was. Throwing away everything that he did for her; she didn't even know where to start how Jim would feel about it.

She felt it was over when he saw her in the prison cell. She made no attempt to defend herself about the way she was again. She only put Raynor's gun into his hand and brought it to her head and gave him a choice to kill the monster that he vowed to kill years ago. But she also reminding him he believed in her while others didn't. The question she had for him was: did he still believe in her? The answer was unclear when Raynor put all six rounds into the wall and walked out telling her that they were finished.

When she organized her swarm to warp to Korhal, she gave Jim one last vision of everything that happened when they were separated. She didn't know why she did it. She didn't believe that anything could make Jim forgive her for what she did. Her vision would only anger him even further.

Regardless, she gave it to him because he deserved to know the truth and let him decide what to make of it. Then she left him alone. It was the best she could do to ease what little pain she could.

With Korhal in front of her, and nothing else that tied her to her old life, she moved on to fulfill the vow she made when she set out to gather her army. She made great progress against Mensgk's foolish bodyguards and now she was only moments away from completing her task.

But right now. She didn't know what it meant seeing the one person she thought she had left for good standing in front of her with his army behind him.

"I… never thought you'd come back," She said.

"We're both tied up in whatever happens here today," Raynor replied. "We do it together."

"Jim…" She said with hesitation. There were many things she wanted to say but it wasn't the time for words. All she could say was, "Thank you."

"Thank me later, it's time you put your war face on."


	4. Part 4

_Jim, weren't you supposed to be evacuating civilians?_

_Valerian and Horner got that handled. I had other things to do._

_Alright! Keep that left flank clear while I go put a hurt on Mengsk!_

* * *

In the Hyperion innovatory, there were 17 Goliaths, seven Diamondbacks, eight Siege Tanks, twelve Wraiths, ten Vikings, eight Banshees and four Thors as well as a vast number of light vehicles including Vultures and Hellions. After Char, there innovatory was lower but they gained some additions to their forces when some of the Umojan vehicles were given to them and some of the security personnel volunteered to join the ranks. The infantry numbered roughly 700, total. Some were his standard Marines, Marauders, Medics, Firebats, Reapers and Specters. The rest were some of the Mercenaries Jim contracted before the invasion of Char.

After the evacuation, the newly formed rebel fleet separated after the Dominion ambush at Phaeton so they wouldn't be all destroyed together if they ran into another ambush. During the time Sarah went to reclaim the swarm after the news that Raynor was dead was released, the Hyperion went world to world evading the Dominion collecting new recruits from worlds that were fed up with the Dominion.

The Hyperion landed inside the bases' perimeter. When it did, the rest of Raynor's troops and vehicles dispersed ready for the fight. In just minutes later, new bunkers, missile turrets and other defenses were up and running. Their numbers were small and they didn't have any reinforcements other than what they had on the ship. If they were going help Sarah win this fight, they would have to attack strategically and advance slowly with minimum casualties.

"Alright people," Raynor said on his com. "I want you to form your teams and begin to advance on my orders."

On Kerrigan's side, her Zerg were now beginning to make more ground. She led a push north of her primary Hive after Jim arrived. They plowed through the barricades without much trouble and cleared out the forfeited troops and gun emplacements in the buildings. They pushed up until the roads led to a park that was transformed into a dominion a base. It was heavily fortified so she decided to wait for the assault on it until they gained more ground elsewhere.

She was on her way to the eastern base she infested when she heard Zegara. "Your swarm is assaulting Terran forces in several entrenched positions. If you can attack these positions from behind and destroy them we will join the slaughter."

From across the sector, Sarah sensed the locations of the Barricades around the perimeter of the sector. There were five of them; two on the western perimeter and three on the eastern side.

Back over on the western sector, Raynor's base was fully operational within 30 minutes and the troops were ready to go.

"This is Alpha team. We're green to go," Raynor heard on his com. "This is Bravo team, good to go."

"Alpha, move up on the overpass. Bravo, start your advance up the northwestern avenue."

"On the move, sir."

Raynor's attack strategy was to divide his forces into four teams that would advance together up certain roads toward the palace. Every time they took out a barricade, dropships, call sign air-horn, would take off and deliver a "package" of SCVs and fresh troops to the cleared out barricade. The SCV's would patch up any damaged vehicles of the assault teams and set up new bunkers and missile turrets. Some of the fresh troops would then fall in line with the team as replacement troopers while the rest of them would man the new bunkers and hold the position. These barricades would act as fall back and insertion points. Alpha and Bravo were the first two teams that would start the march up toward the Palace. After a while, after a few cleared out barricades, Charlie and Delta would join the fight. The Raiders' Banshees, Vikings and Wraiths stood by to make strategic strikes on the Dominion and give air support when the assault teams got in trouble.

Just a few minutes after the teams dispersed up the roads, several Dominion banshees moved in from the northeast accompanied by several dropships. The missile turrets opened up on the airships but the dropships started to drop their passengers before major damage was done to them. The Raiders' Wraiths launched quickly from the Hyperion. They swooped in launching their Gemini missiles at the airships downing them within seconds. The rest of the troops that dispersed from the dropships were taken care of by the base's defenses.

"Jim, I saw they attacked your base," Kerrigan spoke to him from across the sector.

"A light attack but it's taken care of," he said.

"It was a diversion, a larger force was coming in from the east but my brood took them out before they arrived."

"Alright, thanks for the help."

"Jim, I'm sending some of my Zerg to your base for some extra protection," she said.

"Alright darling," Raynor replied a little surprised. "Just don't stretch your forces too thin for my sake."

"Trust me, Jim. I've strength to spare."

Several minutes later, a dozen Zerg arrived from the southern road, Swarm Hosts and Impalers, They went to the northern section of the base and burrowed ready to attack anything that got too close.

"This it Bravo team, we've made contact with the next Barricade and are taking some fire. Requesting air support."

"Roger. Razor-hawks, fly to Bravo's location and give them support. Star-screams guard Razor flight and give Bravo team fire support on the ground."

"We're already there." The Razor-hawks, the Raiders' Banshees, took off accompanied by four Star-Screams, their Vikings. Several Siege tanks were bombarding Bravo team from the barricade. Razor flight cloaked and moved in while Vikings pulled back and transformed into walker mode by where Bravo was pinned down. The barricade didn't have any missile turrets built where it was so it would be easy pickings for Razor flight. But they would have to be swift because Dominion could request a scanner sweep on the area to reveal the attackers.

The Four banshees swooped in. Two of them carrying regular missiles focused on the tanks while the other two that were loaded with incendiary rockets unloaded on the infantry below. Once the tanks were out of commission and the Dominion troops got burned, the flight u-turned and headed straight back to the Hyperion.

"Good hits! Good hits!" The soldier shouted on the radio. "We'll take care of the rest."

Meanwhile, Alpha team got had eyes on the next barricade. They were about to move in and attack when they saw several Raptor Zerglings leap through the air onto the overpass from behind the Dominion troops. The siege tanks were venerable from the close-up Zerg while the dominion soldiers shot wildly around them.

The siege tanks in Alpha team set themselves up and bombarded the barricade. Because the Raiders' siege tanks had the new LarsCorp smart shell, they didn't have to worry much for friendly fire since the shells' IFF reader shaped the rounds' blasts away from friendly units nearby. Before the Hyperion landed, the siege tanks' software was programmed to register Zerg as friendlys. With the Zerglings taking most of the fire, Alpha team unleashed their arsenal against the barricade when they came into range. Within a few seconds, the barricade was cleared out. The Raptors turned around and leapt off the highway back down to the streets below.

"This is Alpha. We've taken care of the barricade with the help of your girlfriend's servants."

Ranyor smiled at the trooper's remark. "Air-horn 1, bring a package to Alpha's position. Patch 'em up and get the barricade up."

"Roger. ETA, one minute."

"This is Bravo, we've taken out our first barricade with light casualties. Awaiting package."

"Copy. Air-horn 2, make your delivery to Bravo."

When the dropships took off, eight of the burrowed Zerg popped out of the ground and started marching up the road. Some followed bravo's path while the rest went Alpha's. On the southern road, more Swarm hosts and Imapilers came up and took the departed Zerg's places. Raynor smiled thinking how Sarah gave some attention to his part of the fight and worked to help their end.

"Both teams, you have some Zerg heading up to give some extra defense to your barricades," Raynor said on his com. "Bravo team, begin your next advance. Alpha, hold your position in case of counter attack."

"Acknowledged,"

Moments later, the banshees that aided Bravo team arrived back at the Hyperion and the Vikings that accompanied them arrived minutes later.

"Shadow four, move up to that sky scraper northeast of alpha's position; it'll be a good perch for you."

"They won't see us coming."

Most of the specters Raynor had on his side preferred to carry the AGR-14 rifle with their armor piercing rounds which were very effective for close combat assaults against armored units as well as normal infantry. But there were others that preferred to carry the traditional C-10 rifle like most ghosts carried for longer range and precision. Shadow four was a sniper specialist team and getting that perch would be a birthday present.

On Kerrigan's end, she was making ground too. They did have some setbacks from a major dominion assault that knocked the Zerg in the center back several barricades. Kerrgian moved in herself and flanked the troopers and allowed the swarm to move up the middle and reclaim the barricades before the dominion could set up the defenses.

With the center clear, she followed the road on the eastern most side of the sector. Just ahead was the first avenue that was being assaulted by Zagara's brood. Two bunkers were in place at the choke point at the entrance while three pairs of bunkers covered each road of the intersection.

Kerrigan moved in with her troops. The first ones that ran into the crossfire was a large pack of freshly hatched banelings. Because they were the splitter strain, the ones that died from enemy fire gave birth to their two smaller offspring that ran in to deal whatever damage they could. When the full pack of banelings converged onto the bunkers on the southern part of the intersection, the bunkers and the troops inside them dissolved while the baneling spawns emerged and moved on to the other bunkers on the intersection.

From up the road Sarah could see Dominion reinforcements on their way to take on the Zerg advance on the major barricade. Once the Northern bunkers were cleared out she sent three Torresque Ultralisks to stall the attack. While they advanced she sent the rest of her assault forces to attack the bunkers guarding the entrance to the sector. Kerrigan blasted one of the bunkers and her swarm took care of the other without trouble.

"The way is clear Zagara. Move your troops into the sector."

"With pleasure my Queen."

A fresh flow of Zerg including many Zerglings, Hydralisks and Banlings flowed into the sector.

The Torresques tore through the ground troops of the dominion assault as much as they could before they fell. But because they were the torresque strait, the rebirth cocoon formed and they arisen shortly afterward to deal even more damage.

Zagara's brood caught up with the Torresques and joined the fray. The banlings rolled in and exploded in the mass of troops while healing the nearby Torresques and zerglings with their regenerative acid. Up above, banshees were firing down on them but the large group of Hydralisks came and unleashed their needle spines at them. The armor piecing spines embed into the hulls of the ships. Some of them piercing through the cockpit and killing the pilots while other Banshees suffered great damaged to the rotor blades to the point where they tumbled out of control and careened to the ground or into a nearby building.

"We will continue the attack, my queen," Zagara said humbly to Sarah after the last of assault forces was done in.

"Continue on," Kerrigan replied.

Just then, Mengsk's voice echoed over the streets again.

"Sky fury squadron, destroy the Hyperion."

From Raynor's position, their radar spiked with multiple airborne contacts on a direct bearing to the Hyperion. From where Kerrigan was, she could feel them too.

"Pretty big fleet heading this way," Raynor spoke to Sarah on his com. "Could use some help taking these guys down."

"That won't be a problem."

Kerrigan moved down the southeastern entrance toward Jim's base. From afar, Sarah could see the large flight of airships moving in from behind the palace. Three dozen Banshees and Vikings were flying on a direct course to the Hyperion's location. The fleet was nearly half a mile away by the time she arrived at the western sector. She leapt on top of a building that overlooked the area north of Raynor's base.

"They're almost on top of us. Prepare dread-wings for-."

"There's no need," Sarah said before he gave the order. "Just sit back and watch the fireworks."

She raised both of her hands in front of her. She closed her eyes and focused all of her energy that flowed within her. Kerrigan slowly curled her fingers into fists as it intensified and the building started to shake below her.

"Sarah…?" Raynor said.

Kerrigan opened her eyes and threw her opened hands out. A large surge of energy shot out of her hands heading straight toward the flight of dominion airships. Sarah wasn't kidding when she told Jim to watch the fireworks. The surge detonated with a bright glow and every Viking and Banshee was ripped apart.

"Damn…" All Raynor could do was stare at the sky where the Dominion airships used to be. But what stunned Jim the most was that it all came from Sarah's hands alone.

"Need anything else?" Sarah said to him from atop the building sounding composed and professional.

"Nothing at the moment, darling," Raynor said still bamboozled by Kerrigan's magic trick. "You go ahead and do what you need to do on your end."

"We're mobilizing for an assault on the base at the central park, we could use some help."

As soon as she finished her sentence, Raynor's com crackled with more voices.

"This is Charley team, we're ready to roll."

"This is Delta team, we're ready to move."

"Alright darling, we're coming along," Raynor said. "Charley, move to Bravo's barricade begin your assault to the northeast of it. Delta, link up with Alpha and advance to the central park and take them on."

"Roger. We'll bring the pain."

Charlie and Delta marched out and headed to their locations.

"This is Delta. We've arrived and are now holding hands with Alpha."

Alpha marched ahead while Delta followed twenty paces behind. But after only a few minutes, men started to fall down on the ground. The rest of the infantry ducked down.

"This is Alpha. We're pinned down by sniper fire from the tower. We have men down!"

"Damn! Shadow four, where the hell are you?!" Raynor said.

Alpha and Delta held their position on top of the highway hiding behind the vehicles and the walls on the sides of the highway. They crawled up the road and crept behind the vehicles as several potshots peppered them. But after five minutes, the potshots stopped.

"Sorry we're late," a voice crackled on the radio five more minutes later. "The ghosts put up a tough fight but we've taken the tower."

"Any casualties?"

"Only one of our team got a round in the leg but we have her patched up so don't risk medivac until the area is clear."

"Roger, you have view of the park base?"

"We're setting up right now. Just give us the order."

"Alpha and Delta continue on. Shadow four give them cover fire if they encounter more resistance. When they reach the base or if Kerrigan gets there first, fire away."

"Roger."

"Razor-hawks, what's your status on munitions?"

"We're loaded up and ready to fly."

"Alright, follow Alpha and Delta and give the Dominion hell. Star-Screams do the same."

"Will do."

"Reaper team, move through the streets and meet up with Alpha and Delta when they assault the base."

"Certainly," replied the leader. The dozen Reapers roared out of the base and zoomed up the Highway toward the base.

Kerrigan's brood massed together along the southern edge of the Park where the next major Dominion base was located.

"Zagara redirect your troops toward the central park, we're taking it!"

"As you command, my queen," Zagara replied.

Kerrigan advanced first up from the southern end of the park. The open area between her and the base gave Kerrigan suspicion. She focused her energy and gave of a small psyonic blast that stretched over the open area. The blast wasn't nearly as powerful as the apocalypse blast she unleashed on Sky fiery squadron. But the very low powered blast was enough to trigger the spider mines that were laid out across the open field.

"Jim, be careful, there are mines surrounding the base."

"We got some Ravens accompanying my men. We got it handled."

With her path cleared, Sarah's brood marched in. While they did, Kerrigan moved to the western side of the park and cleared out more mines for Zagara's forces. Her brood joined the fight. The banlings went in first while the rest of the ground forces followed. When the overlapping acid bombs did their part, several vipers flew in and unleashed several disabling clouds covering the entire eastern parameter. As the Dominion troops fired blindly trough the cloud, the Zerg moved in for the kill.

Alpha and Delta marched off the freeway down an exit leading to the park. Once there, they crept across the mine field methodically clearing out any mines the raven above spotted. The Zerg were heavily engaged when they came into firing range of the base. Immediately, the siege tanks and two of the Raiders' thors opened up their long range cannons on them. From above and behind, team four opened up from the tower; one-shot one-kill. Because the base was attacked by Kerrigan's forces first, most of the troops were on that end dealing with the Zerg. The specters on the frontline accompanying Alpha and Delta unleashed ultrasonic pulses on the Dominion leaving them vulnerable. The Ravens above launched three point defense drones in front of the Raiders. The defending Marauders' grenades detonated before they hit their target when they were zapped by the drones' lasers. And arriving just in time, Reaper team zoomed into the fight unloading their P-38 pistols into open infantry as well as throwing D-8 charges into the bunkers.

As the fighting unfolded, the Razor flight unleashed their salvos on the siege tanks and other infantry spread across the base. Dominion Vikings that lifted off from the base moved in to take Razor flight out only to be met by the Raiders' Star-screams as well as several Mutalisks that drifted over to Raynor's front. Only one of the Star-screams took a major hit and needed to make an emergency transformed landing.

"I will not let you destroy Humanity's only chance at salvation." Mengsk's voice echo through the streets again. Raynor had to admit, it was getting very annoying how Arcturus was saying all these righteous statements at them and if he was annoyed, so was Sarah. But that was what Arcturus wanted, to have them distracted to have his pawns push them back.

As the Raiders advanced, their attack overlapped with Kerrigan's. Within several minutes, the base was cleared out. Kerrigan was once again setting up another hive cluster. Nydus worms popped up and supplied reinforcements to her.

"Good work, Jim."

"Alpha, Delta, statues?" Ranyor said on the com.

"Alpha. Lost a couple of infantry and hellions and major damage to some of the goliaths, but we're still ready to fight."

"Delta. About the same. Our Thor's taken a beating and needs repairs."

"We're sending SCVs and reinforcements to you. Once you get patched up and get the wounded aboard for evac, link up with the others on the western side; Alpha to Bravo and Delta to Charlie. Team four, hold position for now. Once we gain more ground, we'll get you to a new firing spot.

"We'll be waiting."

"In the meantime, we're now sending medivac for your wounded teammate. Reaper team, move to barricade four and wait there until I give you another target."

"On the way."

Sarah's new cluster was fully functioning after several minutes. Everything was going smoothly so far; they've taken almost half the sector already, Jim was holding his own and she still had so many forces to spare. After the dropships arrived at her cluster to supply the raiders, they moved out to the west to continue the assault on that side. She sent several groups of Zerglings, Hydralisks and Roaches to follow them on their assault.

"Jim, the fighting beyond this point will get harder. I'm sending parts of my brood to accompany your teams."

"I hear ya'. Appreciate the help, darling."

She was about to proceed to the west to push on to the next avenue where the other part Zagara's brood were assaulting when Mengsk spoke again.

"Alpha squadron, destroy that damnable ship!"

"Battlecruisers inbound," Jim said over his com. "Might need your help on this one Sarah,"

"I'm on my way," Sarah said immediately.

Sarah arrived just outside the Hyperion's landing site a few minutes later. Alpha squadron soured over the palace as they flew on a direct course to the Hyperion. The BattleCursers were a newer model than the minotaur-class cruisers. They resembled many features of the experimental Loki battlecruiser that the Raiders destroyed at the Valhalla research facility where they hijacked the Odin. The new Armageddon Cannons on the bow of the ship dealt more devastating punches to any enemy on the air or ground and the shape of the ship made it a floating fortress.

"Can you do what you did to the airships earlier?" Raynor said to Kerrigan.

"I could but I won't be able to destroy them all. It'll cause serious damage and take down their escorts but they'll still be flying."

"Do what you can, darling."

Because Arbather had lost the corrupter strain for the Mutilisks, Kerrigan's swarm did have a slight disadvantage with air to air combat especially when it came to Battlecrusiers. A large group of Mutalisks with the sundering glaive could take down the cursers if the concentrated their attacks but it was usually costly with the anti-air canons on the ship. Several spine crawlers from around the sector uprooted and dashed across the creep that had spread across the ground in all directions. They settled in the streets that lay between the Hyperion and alpha squadron.

When the fleet of three cruisers and their escorts came into range, Kerrigan charged up her energy atop the roof. When she finished charging, she unleashed it at the fleet. The blast brightened the sky and shook the ground. Like Kerrigan said, the Battlecrusiers were still flying but they suffered immense damage as well as losing their escorts. Several decks were on fire and there were several breeches in the hull. Despite the damage, the Battlecruisers pressed on.

The spore crawlers shot their spores just as the ships unleashed their Armageddon cannons on the streets. While that happened, the Hyperion released its Wraith fighters, dread-wings, who were accompanied by the Raiders' Star-screams. They were soon joined by several flights of mutalisks that flew in from the east. When they came into range, the front two cruisers unleashed a barrage of anti-air missiles at them. The missiles mostly went to the mutalisks who were closer. The raiders' ships managed to dodge the area where the missiles detonated. The anti-air guns on the ships erupted at the mixed group of attackers. The mutalisks concentrated their sundering glaives onto the ATA lasers and weak points in the hulls. The Wraiths and Vikings dispersed and fired their munitions into the hull while others swooped in behind and unloaded their munitions into the engines. Because they moved around the front two cruisers, the third in the back couldn't fire its ATA guns without hitting their sister ships.

Again and again, Alpha Squadron took hits from the air and the ground until they couldn't take anymore. The lead cruiser was the first to go when the bridge was destroyed and flight controls were inoperable. It cairned to the right and its nose slammed into the side of the other cruiser. The hull of the second cruiser split in half from the impact. Both of them fell down and tore through the buildings under it as they collided into the ground shaking the entire sector from the impact. The last cruiser didn't take as long to take out as the first two but its demise was just as interesting. When the Raiders found a pressure point on top of the engines, they converged on it with the help of the rest of the Mutalisks. What resulted was another firework show as the damaged engines violently overloaded. The explosion ran up half of the ship and the front section dived down into the ground just as the remaining debris clunked down over the streets.

"Great work, everyone! Thanks again."

The Raiders suffered losses of one Viking and two Wraiths while five other craft were severely damaged. Every wounded ship managed to limp back to the Hyperion in one piece. The Mutalisks suffered more losses. But it didn't matter because their numbers were numberless and losses were easily replaceable.

Kerrigan returned to her new Hive cluster at the cleared out park once the Battlecruisers were taken care of. On the other side of a chasm to the north of it was a generator that powered a bridge control counsel that extended from the buildings to the streets connected to the park. Right now, it was retracted.

With her Primal Zerg power flowing through her hybrid body, Kerrigan leapt up into the air over the chasm. She glided down at the edge of the guarded bridge consul just as the bullets rained up at her. She retracted her wings and dropped down. She slammed into the ground with a large psyonic blast that surged around her launching the guards and vehicles into the air. With them disoriented she looked over at the power generator. She raised her hand and Psyonic energy emanated from it. The generator started to rotate faster and faster. Behind her, the bridge extended and connected to the streets on the other side where her swarm was waiting. When it was fully extended, she concentrated more energy into the generator until it overloaded and burst apart. The bridge was there to stay. Her brood ran across the bridge and engaged the troops getting back up after Kerrigan's stunt. When they were neutralized, the Brood moved on to advance further up the middle.

One Raynor's side, his boys were making great ground with the assistance of the Zerg escorts. Several times, the teams came across Dominion strike teams. The with the added fire power of the Roaches and Hydralisks, the infantry stood little chance as they were torn asunder every encounter. After several torn down barricades, Kerrigan spoke to Raynor.

"Jim, your men are coming up on a guarded avenue were some of my Zerg are trying to get through," Kerrigan said. "Take them out and they'll help."

"We'll do what we can, darling," Raynor replied.

Bravo team moved up with its Zerg escort toward the upcoming barricade. They saw four pairs of bunkers guarding the four points of the intersection with a number of vehicles guarding it. Among the vehicles, there were four advanced Thors that stood on the southern and eastern streets.

"This is Bravo. We're on top of the barricaded entrance. They've some tough defenses with tanks and some mean looking Thors. We'll get burned if we assault them."

Before Raynor could reply, Kerrigan replied first.

"Don't worry. I'll have them do the fighting for you."

Raynor realized what she meant and grimaced for a moment.

Before long several infesters walked their way up the streets to Bravo's holding point. They burrowed into the ground and slowly moved toward the barricade were the Thors stood. When they got close enough, they popped their heads out of the ground. Before any of the troops could get a shot off, each infester ejected neural parasites up at the Thors' cockpits before burrowing back down into the ground. They slipped away as the parasites broke through the glass of the cockpits. The pilots screamed when it lurched onto them. They rustled in the tight space trying to get it off but it slithered behind them and pierced the back of their necks.

"AAAARGGGGH! IT'S-IT'S-it-it…assimilation successful."

Seconds later, the assimilated Blackhammers pointed their cannons at their former brothers in arms.

"Attack now!" Kerrigan told the Raiders over their com. Bravo's Zerg escorts moved passed them toward the barricade.

"You heard the lady," Raynor said. "Get into the fight!" And the Raiders followed.

Three Black hammers were assimilated out of the four that guarded the barricade. The fourth fired its cannons at one of them but it didn't survive long when assimilated ones concentrated all their fire on it. The fourth was out of commission in only a few seconds. The escorts of Bravo attacked the bunkers and tanks as the Raiders' followed. Their siege tanks fired their regular cannon at the bunkers while the Diamondbacks used their rail guns at the other mechanized units. The barricade was cleared out within a minute. One of the assimilated Blackhammers was destroyed and another was damaged moderately. The Zerg assaulting the avenue massed together and flowed onto the street.

"Avenue's clear. We've got more friends flowing in," Bravo team said on com.

"We're sending the next package to your position, stand by."

Over where Kerrigan was, her brood and Zagara's came up on the third avenue where the Zerg outside the sector were assaulting. The position was similar to the strength of the one Bravo just destroyed only that a Planetary Fortress Command Center stood in the middle of the intersection with its cannons blasting away at the oncoming Zerg forces. Kerrigan had brought over several of the infested Terran units including several siege tanks, Vikings and Banshees as well as some Diamondbacks and Warhounds.

While the Zerg moved in, the infested siege tanks set themselves up and unleashed their cannons onto the bunkers and the fortress. The Banshees from the first infested base swooped in to deal more damage. The intersection did have missile Turrets so it didn't matter if they were clocked or not. Several Banshees fell to the ground from the turrets below and the Vikings that came in from above. Several of Kerrigan's assimilated Vikings joined the fight and engaged the Dominion fighters. The infested Vikings were clumsy like infested terrans on the ground so they didn't evade many of the Dominion Fighters' attacks. But the infested Vikings did unleash their torpedoes and scored major hits on their enemies before most of them were destroyed. While Kerrigan tore through the bunkers on the ground, three Ultralisks charged into the fortress and ripped their Kaiser blades through it. The avenue was cleared within minutes like the other barricades that fell before it. The Zerg flowed in and joined Zagara's forces as they continued to advance up the eastern side.

"The Dominion of Man is stronger than you. We will see your ashes spread to the wind."

Raynor and Kerrigan were just about to dismiss the hot air when something unexpected happened.

"This is Delta, we're getting hammered by an oncoming assault team."

"Bravo here. They're slamming us hard. They're counter attacking, Sir."

"Understood. All teams fall back to the nearest barricades and hold positions."

On Kerrigan's side it was the same story. The attacks from the Dominion intensified and her advance was stopped cold. When Kerrigan and Raynor thought about it, the first half of the sector was relatively easy to gain ground on. Mengsk was saving his strength for this moment. The barricades on the streets were reinforced with heavier tanks and hundreds of elite soldiers wielding much heavier firepower than normal Dominion troops. Kerrigan ordered all her troops to fall back to the barricades they overtook and amassed together for defense and prepped for the next assault. Raynor did the same setting up his troops at his barricades. The combined fire power of his troops, including spider mines, and the Impailers and Swarm Hosts that accompanied them at the barricades held off the attackers.

Things were going all right holding off the assaulting Dominion for awhile. Raynor felt the counter attack was loosening up when the attacks became less severe on his boys. But the same couldn't be said for Kerrigan. On her side, the attacks only intensified. Raynor thought about why they were shifting their attack to her, leaving his side alone. He realized why when Mengsk's voice echoed across the sector again.

"Remember this Raynor? It was nice of your criminal partner to leave it here for me."


	5. Part 5

Part 5

Raynor's eyes widened when a familiar signature appeared on-scanner. Across the sector, he heard cannons fire and the shells' concussions shook through the earth all the way to him.

"This is Delta. We have some activity on our end. It seems the Zerg troops flowing in are facing heavy resistance up ahead."

From across the sector, Sarah saw what was slowing down the brood coming in on the western entrance.

"Assault team heading our-" the Raider on the radio stopped his sentence. "Oh God! Take cover! Take cover!" Gunfire erupted on the radio that could be heard from where the fire fight was really happening. "Damn it! We're all getting killed here! Command, we're taking heavy fire. They've broken through the defenses and our Zerg escorts have been pulverized. We have men down! Requesting evac! Repeat, we nee-," the explosion that silenced the radio call confirmed Raynor's fear.

"Jim, what's going on?" Sarah said.

"He's set out the Odin! All troops fall back! Pull back now! Sarah, keep going! You've got to finish this."

"Jim, what are you doing?"

"Get your troops together and break through the line. Go on without me."

The words sent a chill through Sarah. For an instant, she was back in the dropship looking at the broadcast announcing the death of Jim. She could feel the helplessness and powerlessness from losing the one thing that ever meant anything to her after she was freed from the dark influence that clung to her for four long years. She couldn't begin to imagine what she'd feel if she'd just stood back and let him really die knowing she actually could do something this time. That was not going to happen.

"Like hell I will! Hold on Jim, I'm coming."

"No! If you come over here, Mengsk'll break through your line. Don't risk losing the fight on account of me. Get your troops together, get to Mengsk and finish this!"

"There is no way in hell I am letting you be a scapegoat, Jim! You told me we're in this together."

"Sarah-"

"You died once and I'm not having you die now. Not when I have something to say about it! Just shut up and hold on!"

Hearing her say those words made Jim come to a realization.

The moment when he heard Mengsk's words to leave Sarah behind on that infamous day was one that he'd never wish to experience again. It was that feeling of helplessness and powerlessness to stop something that he should have seen coming and not being able to do anything to save the only thing that could ever matter to him. The only thing that he could do was to secede from the evil he now saw and vow to see it burn to the ground for the sake of the one person who was one of many victims of that man's betrayal.

Kerrigan was put in the exact same spot. She gathered her army and gathered her strength to bring down the one who caused her the most pain. But now, that thing she valued the most that was lost was found again. But from what she did, she couldn't be with him the way they could have. She accepted that and she did what little she could do for him.

Raynor understood that she couldn't let him die when she could do something about it now. The guilt would only be even more painful knowing you could have done soothing but didn't. And this confirmed that the invasion wasn't only for revenge anymore; some of it, perhaps most of it, was for him. Not for justice in his name, but for his true freedom. Mengsk had him a hunted man ever since he left the Sons of Korhal and he would be as long as Arctures sat on that throne in the distance. It wouldn't mean a thing if Jim died now. Plus Jim did say that they were in this together. He couldn't betray his word.

"Zagara, gather your forces on the eastern side and hold off the attackers," Sarah said.

"Yes, me Queen. We will keep them from advancing too far," Zagara replied.

The Zerg had played well defensively against the counterattack amassing their forces at the barricades. But now, Kerrigan had to thin some of them and redirect some of the flow of troops to the western side. If Kerrigan managed to pull this off, she'd be able to get back to her end and hopefully regain the ground they would lose before things got too serious.

"This is shadow four, we've eyes on the Odin," the specter's voice cracking in on the intercom. "It's accompanied by several escorts; at least a hundred marines and a dozen Goliaths upfront. We've also got eyes on several Vikings flying above for air cover and a Raven giving eyesight."

_Damn._ It was going to be harder since the Odin had its weaknesses covered by its escorts.

"How far from the Hyperion?" Raynor asked.

"About three quarters of a mile. They're coming up on Barricade 5. The mines are being cleared out."

"And the Zerg defenses?"

"They're inflicted some casualties on them but…" there was a brief pause "They just got pulverized. Repeat; the Zerg have been wiped out. They're through the barricade. Auto turrets have done zilch on them."

"Are there any more teams coming our way?"

"We're tracking several teams coming in. Several are converging in on the Odin's destination. The others are scattering out to clean up the streets."

Sarah heard the report. "Jim, I'm sending some of my Zerg to stall the other teams coming your way. I'm going after the Odin."

"Alright Darling," Jim said. He looked at the command console and saw the Odin's position and the path it was following. "We can box them in at Barricade 2. Come down on them there and we might just be able to send that hunk-a-junk to the scrapheap."

Barricade 2 was the first barricade that Bravo cleared out that was closeted to the Hyperion. The street north of it was littered with Spider mines that the Raiders' Vultures set up. If they could catch the Odin at the intersection just north of barricade 2, then they could get enough fire on it to take it out with Sarah's help.

"Charley, hold up at barricade 2. Bravo, Alpha, linkup and flank the Odin from the west once they come within range of Charley."

"Copy."

"Shadow four; don't give your position away until I say so. Fire on my order."

"Roger."

"Star-screams, I need you to fly in and take out the Raven that's accompanying them. Do it quick before they can get a bead on you. Dread wings and Razor hawks follow in close and go dark when the Raven's down."

Everything that followed went as Jim and Sarah planed. Charley fortified barricade 2 setting up their tanks by the bunkers while the troops not occupying the bunkers took cover in the buildings and behind the rubble. The Zerg that flowed in from the western avenue moved to stall several of the teams that were converging on the Odin while several of Kerrigan's Zerg from the south moved to stall the others coming in from the east. She moved with her primary group to spearhead the Odin directly. Since the Odin was close to the Raiders' positions, she couldn't unleash another apocalypse blast without friendly fire. She would have to take it down the old fashioned way.

"Shit! This is Alpha, we've come under fire from another Dominion team. We're not going to make it to flank the Odin."

"Reaper team, get up to Alpha and Bravo and give them fire support." Raynor quickly replied. "Alpha and Bravo, hold them off and get to the Odin as quick as you can. Shadow four, give Alpha and Bravo cover fire until I tell you to otherwise."

Sarah saw the situation and ordered the Zerg coming in from the western avenue to aid Raynor's strike teams.

The Odin was coming down the avenue toward barricade 2. Before it came within firing range of the Raiders, the star-screams came in. The Dominion Viking escorts did come in to engage them but the cloaked dread wings downed a number of them before they fired on the star screams. Using their long reaching Lenzer Torpedoes, the fighters shot at the Raven accompanying the Odin. As soon as it was downed, the Star-Screams pulled back as quick as they could.

Without the ability to see cloaked and hidden targets, the Razor hawks awaited to come in and unleash their payload in the escorts. The Marines up front marched ahead toward the Spider mines. But before they emerged from the ground, the marines started firing and the mines harmlessly detonated out of range.

"Damn, they scanned the area. Razor hawks hold off, repeat hold off."

The Raiders' banshees did what they were told and kept their distance from the Odin.

Kerrigan arrived at the barricade just in time. When the Odin came within range of Charlie's guns, they opened up while Kerrigan advanced on them. The Odin's guns opened up and several layers of Kerrigan's brood were shredded before they even touched the leading escorts. Luckily, Kerrigan came prepared. Several Vipers swooped in and released a batch of disabling clouds on the escorts. Because the Dominion Vikings were fighting the Raiders' fighters and several Mutilisks that Kerrigan brought along with her, the vipers had little trouble casting the clouds.

In the suffocating cloud, the troopers fired wildly around them while the brood moved in on their pray. Sarah walked through and sliced apart every marine that crossed her path. By the time the clouds dissipated, three-fourths of the escorts were torn apart with the combined efforts of the Raiders' siege tanks' fire and Kerrigan's attack. All that was left now was the Odin. But there was problem.

"Crap! They're sending reinforcements," Charlie's officer yelled.

From the North several dropships were flying in to where the Odin was fighting. And several more dominion assault teams were moving in on its position. If they kept Sarah's brood and her allies occupied with the escorts, the Odin wouldn't get enough damage and more damage would be done to them in the long run.

"Jim, concentrate all fire on the Odin. Take it out before it does serious damage."

"Doing what we can darling."

Sarah sent most of her brood over to stall the reinforcements while she stayed behind to fight with the Raiders to attack the Odin. She saw how powerful the Odin's cannons were compared to the thors she easily smashed so many times. Not only could they destroy heavy targets easily, the splash damage was devastating on clustered light units. She sent several Torresques ahead to draw its fire while she and the Raiders converged in on it. The Odin was about twice the size of an Ultralisk so several of them should be able to even the odds. Each giant took a few hits from the Odin's cannons before they fell one-by-one into their rebirth cocoons. The last two managed to make it to the Odin and slam into the metal monstrosity. The metal monster was knocked back several yards across the intersection but was still on its feet.

But before the surviving Ultralisks could dig their Kaiser blades into the Odin, several of the Dominion reinforcements came to the Odin's aid. A squad of elite marines and marauders opened up on the Ultralisks and they fell shortly. Their rebirth cocoons were destroyed before they could rise again to deal more damage. But the others that fell earlier emerged and they joined the rest of the Zerg that Kerrigan lead into the brawl. Kerrigan influenced her brood coming in from the south to head in and attack the teams that were coming in to aid the Odin from the east.

"This is Bravo. We're moving in on the Odin now."

And like they said, Alpha and Bravo team were coming in from the west accompanied by the flow of Zerg coming in from the western avenue. Reaper team was accompanying them and Shadow four was now putting their marks on the Dominion teams coming in. The Razor hawks took the opportunity of the chaos and unleashed their salvos of rockets onto both the Odin and the strike teams.

The Odin and the reinforcements were now completely boxed in. The fighting machine was firing it's cannons left and right, primarily at the Zerg Kerrigan lead in up from Barricade 2. Many of the buildings surrounding the intersection were trampled or blown apart, leaving some more open area for maneuvering but it wasn't much. Again and again, the Odin received devastating blows from both the Raiders and the Zerg while the escorts were torn apart easily. Marauder punisher grenades and Mutilisk sundering glaives punctured the armor leading to several malfunctions in the Odin's performance. The cannons on the Odin went off of target and only did minimal damage to those unlucky enough to be caught in the blasts. Kerrigan fought most of the escorts that were closest to her. Now seeing the Odin in its degrading state, she turned her attention to it. She unleashed pulses on several pressure points on the ground. Then she leapt up. She ascended to the leave of the cockpit. Through the thicker glass she could see the pilot franticly fiddling with his controls trying to fire on all the hostiles swarming around him. He looked up and saw Kerrigan hovering several yards in front of him. Kerrigan tightened her fists as energy brewed inside of her. Moments later, she unleashed a concentrated blast at the cockpit. The entire cockpit was blown out leaving the metal monstrosity immobile. When Kerrigan descended onto the pavement, the torn apart Odin tilted backward and fell into the side of several buildings.

"We did it!" Raynor said. "The Odin's down for the count!"

"How are you holding up?" Sarah said to him standing up from her crouch.

"Don't you worry about us, we're still in this."

For the most part, Raynor was mostly right. The fight at the Odin's position had ceased with the rest of the Dominion teams falling back. Charley team had suffered a number of casualties and crashed vehicles while Bravo and Alpha lost a bit more including one of their thors from the Dominion team that assaulted them before they fought the Odin. Several of the Razor Hawks were downed along with a number of Dread Wings and Star Screams. But like Raynor said, they were still in the fight.

Already the Dominion had set up new emplacements at the barricades that were cleared out by the Odin and the other Dominion teams. They really had given them a hard punch to the face but they wouldn't give up, not when the goal of the Raiders and Sarah was sitting in his palace just in the distance.

Kerrigan returned to the eastern side. Her losses were similar to the losses on Raynor's side. Several of the barricades were cleared out and they lost major ground. The dominion were now knocking on the doorstep of the base that Sarah had infested first and the base at the Park way was cleaned out. Fortunately, since Kerrigan fried the bridge control connecting the park to the other side of the chasm, the bridge was stuck there for her to use when she regained her ground. The Dominion was also attempting to plug up the second avenues where Zagara's brood was flowing through but they were having some trouble doing so. But the worst part was that more Battle Cruisers were coming in to give fire support and they were pounding the Zerg hard. Regaining the lost ground was going to be harder than the first time now.

Sarah arrived at the infested base where the Dominion was just about to break through the row of spore and spine crawlers. Several Marines were moving in with several Warhounds and walker mode Vikings backing them up. She approached them from the western avenue and slipped in behind them. Before the first marine spotted her, she was already tearing all of them apart. With her wings, she sliced through all the marines and weaved around the mechs denying any of them a clear shot at her. She landed a powerful aerial punch on a Warhound nearly shattering the machine in half. The action was just enough for the rest of the Zerg to close in and tear the rest apart. Once the last was dealt with, drones flowed in and started mutating into replacement crawlers while the rest of the Zerg flowing in from the Nydus worms and those flowing in from the southern entrance. Kerrigan quickly gathered her forces and advanced up to the first avenue where Zagara's forces were flowing in. Sarah arrived just in time when a dominion strike team was in the process of plugging it up. Her brood flanked them and they were no longer impairing Zagara.

Over where Raynor was, the teams were patched up and Charlie and Bravo linked up and worked hard to push the line back up to the avenue where the Zerg were flowing in. They managed to get there with the help of fresh Zerg escorts that arrived. The Zerg flowed in and put more pressure on the Dominion line.

The battle to regain the lost ground was harder but both Sarah and Jim managed to regain most of it with moderate casualties. But three-fourths of the way up the lost ground, Battle Cruisers had blocked their path. Raynor's fighters were starting to dwindle as well as the rest of his vehicle supply. Only nine of Raynor's goliaths were operational and their anti-air missiles could do some damage to the cruisers but they wouldn't last too long alone. They couldn't risk losing too many valuable forces because they needed to save their strength for the final stretch. But it was going to be harder now that the Battle Cruisers were in place. But that problem didn't hinder them for too long.

"Commander, this is the Hyperion."

"Go ahead."

"Sir, we're reading a small fleet of Battle Cruisers that have just warped into Korhal's orbit."

"Dominion?"

"Negative. We have their ID signatures." the crewman paused. "Sir, they're ships from our fleet. There're four- wait, five. The Jackson's Revenge is with them sir. It looks like they all got your call."

Raynor felt relief and excitement fill him. Before he sent the Hyperion down to the surface, he sent a message to the rebel fleet scattered around Dominion space to come and aid them. Good thing they did too since they were stretched thin as it was. And even the Jackson's revenge got the call. After Char, the Jackson, loaded with most of Raynor's mercenary contracts, slipped away from Char while the Hyperion and the rest of the fleet ran from Mengsk.

"The Jackson is hailing us sir. It seems they want to talk to you about their rates."

"Tell them that they can plunder what will be left of the palace and the riches in the sector once the fighting's over. Tell it to them and the rest of the mercs aboard."

Several minutes later, the Hyperion operator spoke again, "They've agreed sir."

"Alright. Tell them and the rest of the boys to get down here and get in the fight," Raynor said. "Sarah, I've some friends who want to join the party. Tell your Zerg up above to let them through."

"I've heard. They're free to pass."


	6. Part 6

Part 6

The rebel fleet wasted no time getting into the fight. They dispersed from formation after coming out of warp and descended down to the planet. The Jackson flew as the tip of the spear ahead of two trailing ships down to the Imperial sector while the other two flew further out before descending through the atmosphere. The Jackson and the other two behind her leveled off several miles above the western side of the sector where Raynor's boys were working to make up lost ground.

Before the Jackson dove down to get into the fight, it angled its bow down at a Dominion Battle Cruiser that was flying low over the roof tops firing down on Raynor's boys and their Zerg escorts. The Jackson charged up its Yamato cannon and let it loose. The shot connected. The cruiser shuddered and veered to its left and collided with the buildings and streets below clear of any of Raynor's troops. The other two of the Raiders' cruisers followed suit and unleashed their cannons on one singe cruiser that was just about to come in to engage the Raiders. Both shots hit the cruiser in the exact same spot. The concentrated blast pierced right through the ship to the other side. It fell straight down like a dead weight right on top of the buildings and several Dominion emplacements.

After the opening gambit, the Jackson and its followers descended closer to the ground. Several drop ships, drop pods and fighters dispersed from her and from the trailing rebel ships. The first wave of Raynor's contracted mercenaries descended down to the streets below where Raynor's boys were waiting. Several of the drop pods landed where Alpha, Bravo and Charley were engaged. The pods stabilized and several War Pigs, Hammer Securities and even a few of the Devil Dogs joined Raynor's teams while other pods landed behind the Dominion lines and flanked the Dominion teams. The drop ships followed closely and unloaded more mercenaries at Alpha, Bravo and Charley's locations. More infantry marched out as well as several heavy vehicles including Spartan Company Goliaths and Siege Breaker tanks and some of the ships dropped off a few Thors. The Hel's Angles and the Dusk Wings as well as several fresh Wraiths joined the fight too. The extra fire power from the fresh troops and the Jackson's guns turned the tide of the battle swiftly.

The other two cruisers that didn't follow the Jackson did their gambit on two of the cruisers that were impeding Kerrigan's forces. One of the Yamato Cannon blasts landed on the starboard side of the Dominion ships' engines and the entire side of the ship was blown off as it crunched into the metal of the streets below. The other blast did major damage to the other cruiser but it wasn't enough to take it out. But it did enough damage for Sarah's anti-air fire to finish the job. The ship cairned to its right and went belly up before crunching down to the ground. The two Raider Cruisers dispersed their share of troops on Kerrigan's end to aid in the push forward. Several of the Raiders fell from hostel fire but their attacks were enough to divert the Dominion's attention for Sarah to swiftly shred through the lines.

Within minutes, the second avenue on the east side of the sector was clear again and the central park was taken back. Zagara's forces flowed into the sector from both points of entry and Kerrigan's forces were flowing across the bridge connected to the central park. Sarah had more Nydus worms popping up giving her more reinforcements to push forward. Because the Dominion counterattack seemed to have failed, Mengsk must have exhausted quite a bit of his dwindling troops leaving his lines thinned. But she couldn't get ahead of herself. The fortifications were still heavy and getting through them wouldn't be a cakewalk.

With half of the sector firmly in her and Jim's control, she observed what she could see of the last half of the sector. The fortifications were heavier than the first half with even more troops who packed even more fire power. She ordered her army to halt and muster together at the front of her line. Jim saw the action and ordered his troops to do the same. Most of his troops gathered on his side while smaller groups stayed on Sarah's side. Several of the fresh troops fell in line under Raynor's command and were organized into new teams including Sierra, Foxtrot and Zulu team. The rest of the Raiders and mercenaries fell in line with their own command group to free Raynor's hands. A new tower was taken by the good guys so Raynor ordered some of his drop ships to relocate Shadow four to their new perch.

Sarah observed the fortifications of the Dominion seeing if there was a way to punch through. They couldn't just rush to the palace with a concentrated Zerg assault. They needed to wipe every trooper off the street so she would be able to take care of Mengsk the way it needed to be done. If they could punch through a critical point, then the other defensive positions would fall afterward. With an overflowing amount of Zerg now at her disposal, Sarah could be able spread her forces out with a little more liberty.

She saw the last two avenues that were blocked off by the Dominion. On the west side, she saw a large gate that blacked off the road leading into the sector. On the other side of the gate, she could sense that Stukof and his division of infested Terrans and aberrations were waiting to move in. On the eastern side, Dahaka's primal pack was trying to advance on the barricade that was put into place next to another large Dominion base.

"Alright Jim," she said. "Make your way to the western avenue were the Dominion has a gate set up. Open it and more Zerg will flow in. I'll break the one on the eastern side. Once they're cleared, get together for the final assault. Burn everyone that gets in your way."

"Sounds like a plan, darling," Jim replied.

With her bulging numbers, Sarah sent her small Zerg teams with Jim's advancing troops while the rest followed her up the middle and eastern side. The two Battle cruisers that cleared the way for her earlier trailed behind her forces to give her fire support while the Jackson and the other two did the same for Raynor's forces. Sarah advanced down an avenue in the central area while she spread a number of her brood down the other avenues. The idea was to have the lesser concentrated groups draw the fire of the surrounding barricades while she broke through the line on her front and come in to flank the other barricades. But that didn't mean that the other approaches were complete cannon fodder. She sent a number of vipers with them to unleash disabling clouds on the barricades. One of the Battle cruisers on her side trailed in behind her while the other followed a diversion team. Two squads of the Raiders' infantry followed her main attack force down the road. They came up on the first barricade in their path. Before they moved in, though, Sarah sent a cluster of Banelings to act as the key for a locked door. The rolling acid bombs dissolved through the barricade in seconds without any of Kerrigan's forces having to lift a talon. They marched through quickly and several of the brood dispersed down the eastern and western streets on the intersection to flank the other barricades.

Raynor did a similar technique with three large assault teams; Alpha and Bravo, Sierra and Charley, and Foxtrot and Zulu, advancing down the streets with the last three of the Raiders' Cruisers falling in behind each of them. Like before, several teams of Zerg accompanied each Raider team. The Roaches were very helpful in thinning light infantry quickly and keeping the rest occupied with the fresh Roachlings that spawned from the corpses. The Raiders were also accompanied by some Swarm Hosts who would spawn their locusts to assault the barricades when the Raiders moved in on them. Some impalers also walked along with them to burrow and take out heavy machinery that came up on the Raiders.

The last western entrance to the imperial sector was several blocks north and another Military Base was between it and the Raiders. Once the teams would gain ground, they would cluster together, assault the base, occupy it and then move on to the avenue and open the gate. Once that was finished, if Kerrigan had opened to other avenue, they would clean up the rest of the streets before they would all come together to assault the palace grounds with the rest of Kerrigan's brood.

With the Swarm's help and the fire support from the Raiders' Battle Cruisers, the three strike teams made it through several of the barricades without many casualties. Kerrigan made larger progress. Each barricade fell one-by-one like dominos. She covered two thirds of the distance to Dahaka's entry point while the Raiders were halfway to Stukof.

But Kerrigan knew that if progress was easy so far, there would be a surprise waiting for her. And sure enough there was a heavy retaliation on her end that stalled her progress. A large heavy infantry and tank force met her brood and stopped the advance cold. The Raider cruisers set up to move in to assist but they were bobbed down when a large fighter squadron moved in on them. The cruisers' anti-air guns opened up and several of Kerrigan's Mutilisks moved in to assist them. Without effective air support, the advance was stalled.

Raynor saw what happened on Sarah's end. He was about to send over the star-screams and Razor hawks along with the other fresh airships he had now.

"Jim, don't worry," Sarah said before he could give the order. "Use your airmen to break over to the avenue. I can handle this."

"Alright darling," Raynor said.

The Razor hawks and the Dusk wings came together and spearheaded the Dominion Barricades Raynor assaulted. With their support, the teams broke through several of them easily. Within twenty minutes of heavy resistance that was cut down relatively easily, they were now just outside the next Dominion base.

"Alright boys," Raynor said. "I want Alpha and Bravo to assault from the east while Foxtrot, Zulu and Charley will assault from the south. Sierra standby and cover the north in case of counter attack."

"Hold on Jim," Sarah said to him. "I'm giving you some keys to the base's door."

Jim held off on the assault until Sarah's "keys" arrived. Several Ultralsks marched up from the Eastern avenues along with clusters of Banelings that rolled right by the Raiders.

"Go right ahead," Sarah said.

"Will do," Raynor replied. "Move up Raiders."

Alpha and Bravo trailed behind five Ultralisks who drew the defenses' fire first. While the colossal behemoths took the initial abuse, the Banelings rolled in behind them to the front. The bunkers up front were the first to fall when they failed to direct their fire from the Torresques to the acid bombs. The remaining Banelings, including the fresh and un-popped Baneling spawns, moved in on the siege tanks behind the line. With the heavy fire drawn away from them, the Raiders marched into the base. The same thing happened down one the southern end. Eight Ultralisks took the fire while the acid bombs cleared the way for the three teams that marched in after them. Up above, several Banshees flew in to give support but the Star Screams along with the Hel's angles unleashed their torpedoes on them. All the troops in the Base ran franticly to the two entry points to plug the holes but the resurrecting Torresques offered to much to them while the Raiders concentrated their fire on anyone that got in their way. Two Dominion battle cruisers were closing in on the overrun base along with two heavy dominion assault teams.

The swarm hosts and impalers rushed to the top of the base and burrowed in. The five Raider teams met at the center of base when the resistance was dealt with. They quickly marched up to the northern section of the base and set themselves up for the attack coming at them. The surviving Ultralisks marched up passed them as well as the rest of the Zerg escorts. Now that the base's anti-air defenses were offline, the Jackson and one of Raiders' ships moved in to face off against the assault. The Dominion ships showed that they were about to fire their Yamato cannons and they were pointing directly at the Raider's ships. Thinking quickly, the Raiders' cruisers activated their defensive matrixes as the blasts were fired. The one blast was given to each cruiser. The enhanced shield generator absorbed the worst of the blast but the blast still dealt a moderate amount of damage to the cruisers. With their energy spent on using the shields, the raider cruisers continued one to fight the Dominion ships. The Goliaths that were apart for the assault on the base unleashed their missiles up at the ships while the Razor hawks sent more volleys of Torpedo's at them. Because the Dominion assault teams on the ground were occupied by the Zerg, they couldn't move in to assist their cruisers. The fighters swooped in and effortlessly evaded the anti-air cannons of the ships and put their lanzer torpedoes on target.

"Alright darling, the base is cleared. We'll be heading out to the avenue as soon as we regroup."

"I'm sending more troops to set up a cluster. The Zerg will spearhead your attack."

"Got it. Just make sure you have enough to make it to the last gate darling."

Like Kerrigan said, Nydus worms popped up around the remains of the base. Fresh Zerg flowed in another Hatchery was being mutated in the center of it. Raynor's teams mustered together at the northern entrance to the base. The Barricade was several blocks ahead and it was even heavier than before with more bunkers, a planetary fortress, BlackHammer Thors, Siege tanks and several heavily armed infantry patrolling in and out of it.

"Ready, Jim?" Sarah said.

"We're ready darling."

Raynor's strike teams banded together and marched down the streets alongside the Zerg. They blasted through the barricades leading up to the avenue where they were waiting for them. Because the Dominion wasn't pointing all of their guns at the Zerg on the other side of the gate, all of their guns would be pointed at them.

The Jackson and the other cruiser moved closer to the barricade as the Zerg moved in. Before they got into range of the guns and missile turrets, they stood back and unleashed Yamato cannon blasts at the barricade. The blasts struck the missile turrets surrounding the intersection leaving only two left.

The Zerg charged in and drew the Fire of the soldiers. When the raiders arrived, they jumped into the brawl. But the plan wasn't to take out the entire Barricade now. It was only a diversion. Unseen, four specters snuck passed the fire fight up to the gate control tower. With ease, they took down the guards and made it to the control console. The hacking took only seconds. The gate controls were established. With a push of a button, the gate blocking the street opened up slowly.

From the western side of the sector Kerrigan sensed the opening.

"Stukof, your path is clear." She reached out to the former Vice Admiral.

"Understood," Stukof said. "Let's finish this."

The gate opened and the legion of infested terrans and aberrations piled in. Intersection's fire was now split up and unable to fight off the enemy coming from either direction. The swarm and the rebels closed in and the barricade was overwhelmed in seconds. The hoard of infested Terrans, including Marines, Marauders and Firebats, marched up the road along with the aberrations up the streets. There was no doubt that many of the Raiders at the intersection were haunted seeing the creatures that were once were of their species walk by them to serve another species. Even though those creatures were formerly fighters for the man the Raider's fought against, the feeling was still unsettling. But the Raiders shrugged off the feeling when they dispersed back into their teams and advanced up the roads.

Sarah held off the counter attack on her side of the battle and drove the Dominion back. But during the attack, one of the Raiders' Battlecusiers took major damage and had to make an emergency landing in a remote part of the sector. It managed to make the landing without much extra damage to the hull or harm to the crew. Sarah was now just a block away from the Dominion base blocking Dahaka's path. She gathered her brood and set out to assault the base head on. The base sat up on an elevated platform with only one ramp leading up to the entrance with plenty of Bunkers, missile turrets and tanks guarding it. The high ground combined with the choke point was an excellently placed position.

The Raptors' wings solved the choke problem but they'd be shredded easily from enemy fire. But since Kerrigan had inhuman athleticism within her, she could leap up over the ledge and draw the dominion's fire while the rest of the brood would pile up the ramp. Throw in some viper disabling clouds, some sneaky infesters to gain control of the base's heavy weapons with their neural parasites, and some long range bombardment from some of the remaining infested thors in her ranks, most of the problems would be solved.

And it happened without a hitch. Kerrigan moved through the base as the dominion tried franticly to halt the Zerg coming in from more than one direction. She tore through any infantry and vehicle that got in her way. Once half of the base was put out of action, she moved to toward the street at the edge of the base were Dahaka's pack was trying to get in. Another Planetary fortress stood in the middle of the street flanked by several bunkers and heavy weapons. But it wasn't a problem when the brood closed in. Several banlings rolled in and detonated into the fortress and bunkers while Ultralisks and other Zerg were breaking into them. Because of the regenerative acid adaptation, the surrounding Zerg's wounds healed up instantly. Within minutes, the barricade ceased to exist.

"The avenue is clear of defenders. Dehaka, send your pack into the sector."

"Yes," Dahaka replied humbly. "We. Will. Feast. Upon. Their. Essence!"

The primal Zerg poured out of the avenue into the Dominion base where they set out to level whatever was left of it. The terrans were probably astonished as they were terrified by the new breed of Zerg she introduced to them, especial the scientists. They would have a field day dissecting the corpses of the primal Zerg when the fighting would cease. It would be one of Sarah's unintentional contributions to humanity.

Near the northern tip of the base, several dropships and Vikings were coming to try and plug the new leak like the four other times they failed to do so. The droships descended over the northern chasm that separating the base's platform from the rest of the city. The primal moved in and tore into the reasons teams pouring onto the platform. It made Sarah wonder what the primal Zerg would do with the Human essence they were collecting since the Human essence wasn't as useful for the swarm only to us the bodies for cannon fodder. But the Primals weren't as evolved as the swarm was. Perhaps some of the medical traits of several of the Dominion troops, like the ones in the family who has the special immune system, could be useful to the Primals.

While the pack feasted on the infantry's essence, Sarah and her brood concentrated on the Vikings and the other aerial vehicles that were swooping in. The response attack failed just like all the others before. Base was completely offline after the last of the dominion was brought down.

"Looks like you broke the last door open, darling." Raynor communicated to Sarah. "We're ready for the final push whenever you are."

Sarah paused and looked up at the Palace that was only a dozen blocks away. She had come a long way through the sector crushing every obstacle that got in her way. With only a few setbacks and with Jim's help, her vendetta was now only minutes away from being finished.

"Get your men together Jim," Sarah replied. "We're finishing this. Once and for all."


	7. Part 7

Sarah stood atop of the luxury apartment building. She surveyed the palace which lay only a mile from where she stood. The streets were littered with Dominion troops that covered every single inch of the roads. Every several yards, a bunker or pair of them rested on the road with clusters of Marines entranced in sand bag pillboxes and in the buildings bearing down on the streets as well as several heavy vehicles that accompanied the infantry. Past the last of the buildings and narrow roads, the Palace courtyard stretched half of the distance from the Palace to where she stood and it was completely covered with the metal of dominion's weapons. This was Mengsk's last line of defense; no one else was coming to save him now.

It would be harder to get up the streets with the overlapping entrenchments and the perches in the buildings. And it would be harder because several of the streets had small psionic-disruptors much like the raiders had developed and used for their assault on her cluster on Char. But Sarah knew they would fail because their numbers were irreplaceable while here swarm was overflowing with thousands and thousands of fresh troops that could shred through anything when they came with everything on a full on charge. With the strength of her forces, Zagara's brood, Stukof's legion of infested Terrans, Dahaka's pack and Raynor's Raiders, they would come in burn everyone in their way.

"Move in," she said.

"As you command, my Queen," Zagara replied.

"Understood," Stukov replied.

"Their. Essence. Will. Be. Ours," Dahaka replied.

"Will do," Raynor replied.

Sarah leapt off the roof and floated to the ground. When she touched down, she ran with her advancing brood. On the eastern avenue, a heavy concentration of Zagara's brood fell in line with Dahaka's pack. More of Zagara's brood intersected with Kerrigan's primary Zerg force that she spearheaded up the middle. Her Brood overlapped with Stukof's legion that overlapped with Raynor's troops who were accompanied by more of her brood on the western side. Raynor's fleet spread out evenly over the approaches as well as the rest of his air force while Kerrigan's air force also spread all over the streets.

The initial assaults leading the charge on the streets were cut down quickly by the over saturated defenses but as more Zerg flowed in, they fire couldn't contain the advance. It was like trying to plug a leak with a toothpick. As Ultralisks, banelings and all the over Zerg moved up the streets, Raptors leapt up at the buildings that were occupied by the infantry firing down on the streets. In the tight corridors, the troops didn't last as the nasty little beasts leapt on them and tore them apart. Sarah's presence on the primary spearhead made the advance much more efficient. Her kinetic blasts tore apart the heavy weapons baring her path while her superior close combat skills made short work of the infantry standing around.

Dahaka's pack and Zagara's forces experienced about the same thing. The advantage they had was that Dahaka's pack was immune to the Psi-disruptors put up on the streets. With the aid of the primal guardians firing down on the Dominion, the advance was rather effective. Raynor's boys along with a number of Sarah's forces and Stukof's legion of infested Terrans advanced at much the same rate on the western side. The ordinary infested Terrans acted as the cannon fodder while the infested infantry would unload as much ordinance as they could before they were shredded by gun or cannon fire. The aberrations acted as tanks as well with their tough armor that absorbed a good amount of damage while they swatted their claws at the dominion lines before they expired. The Raider's took advantage of the diverted fire. The infantry fired on the pill boxes and MG emplacements while the Dominion was occupied by the hoards of human cannon fodder. The Raider's siege tanks set up from behind them and unloaded on the emplacements behind the current line of the Dominion while the other vehicles moved up with the infantry. The specter teams acted as the fire support using their ultrasonic pulses to stun the Dominion Forces. They also moved into the buildings to get rid of the forces firing on the streets and they used those perches for their purposes afterword. All the while, Shadow Four unloaded more and more rounds into any Dominion infantry out in the open. With the help of the Razor Hawks, Dust Wings, Star Screams, Hel's Angles and Sarah's Mutalisks and Vipers, the dominion lines were falling apart, inch-by-inch, foot-by-foot.

Sarah's advance was making the most progress with her help and was two thirds through the fortified streets, one third of the way to the palace, while the rest were half way through the streets, a fourth of the way to the palace. Like the last time when they were half way through the entire sector, she split her forces advancing up the road to flank the other positions so the others could gain ground faster. The slow advance continued down the streets until Kerrigan arrived at the edge of the courtyard. She halted her forces and awaited the rest of her allies to clear out the opposition on their paths. They caught up soon after with the help of her flanking forces. They stood at the edge of the last of the buildings on the street that was just across from the Palace court yard.

_This is it._

The last of Mengsk's futile defenses lay between her and him. It almost seemed pointless for the soldiers to stand and fight with their numbers all but diminished. But like Mengsk's pride, they wouldn't abandon their duties when it came to defending the one person that kept the whole empire together.

Sarah made the first step forward.

"Men, stop the Queen of Blades! For Humanity!"

The battle that followed was what observers of the battle would call poetic while others could simply call it epic. Kerrigan and her allies moved from their positions and converged on the palace. The overlapping Dominion positions opened up with everything they had, but it wasn't enough. Sarah smashed, sliced and blasted through anything that stood in her way as her swarm spread out and torn into the lines with their organic weaponry.

As the Swarm and Primal packs leapt ahead out in the open, the Raiders set up their tanks and their infantry and mechs marched forward blasting away at the entrenchments in their way. Since most of the Dominion's fire was concentrated on the Swarm, Raynor's men suffered relatively low casualties. The battle in the air was just as exciting as the Raiders' Banshees and the swarms Mutalisks unloaded everything they had into the Dominion lines while the rest of the Raiders' fighters took on the last of the Dominion's aircraft including three Battle Cruisers. Vikings and Wraiths unleashed their salvos on the fighters and ships while the four Raider cruisers fired both on the Dominion ground forces as well as the bogies in the air. One of the Raiders' cruisers was put out of commission and they managed a crash landing west of the courtyard. But every Dominion wing in the air was put out of action quickly as the ground forces continued to push forward and depleted the Dominion of the last of their forces. It was a heroic moment for the Raiders and for Kerrigan; being on the frontline seeing the last of the tools of corruption and tyranny crumble by their hands.

The last row of defenders fired what they could into the advancing forces. But their actions were just as those whom the swarm had trampled over. The swarm tore through the last line of defenders leading the gap between the Palace gates and the swarm open and bare. Sarah stepped forward while her swarm stood by her side. She channeled her energy through her body and concentrated it into her hands. She tightened her fists and curled her body slightly before she opened her eyes. She unleashed another large blast but this one was concentrated all at the Gates. The Energy that shot out of her impacted the extremely thick steel door. The metal warped in where the blast impacted and the entire door blew apart leaving a wide entrance into the palace.

"Zegara," Sarah said when she composed herself. "Take command. I have an appointment with the Emperor."

"Long live the Queen." Zagara replied.

Sarah strode forward to the entrance taking the moments of how she finally made it to where she wanted to be for so long; every step she took to get to this place. And now she was finally here. As she entered the Palace, Zagara did as Sarah had instructed. She organized the swarm to set up defensive positions in front of and around the palace. The Terran forces that aided them for the entire assault set themselves up in defensive positions as well. Sarah ordered her swarm not to harm them throughout the assault and Zagara followed through when the swarm fell under her control.

* * *

Raynor exited the drop ship when it landed in the courtyard of the palace where his men had set themselves up in defensive positions in case of improbable counter attack. Several of the Zerg scurried around them obviously in defensive patters.

Something didn't feel right. Mengsk was cornered and no one was coming to pull him out. When the UED conquered Korhal, Mengsk fled to his flagship and attempted to escape but the UED fleet intercepted him before he could get away. The only reason he managed to escape with his life was for Jim and his Protoss friends to come in and bail him out.

"Soldier," Raynor said to one of his troops. "Did she enter the palace alone?"

"It looked like she didn't want anyone to follow for her meeting with that son of a bitch at the top sir," the Raider replied.

Raynor looked back up at the palace with his eyes a little wider. The thought came to him with bad feeling he had. He closed his helmet visor and marched double time into the palace.

* * *

Zagara sensed the Terran in black amour march toward the front gates. She was ordered to keep the area secure and that meant keeping anyone from entering the palace. But Zagara saw that the Terran running into the palace was Jim Raynor whom the queen rescued before the invasion. He seemed to be very important to the queen even though the rest of the swarm, including Zagara herself, saw no value in the life of this particular Terran. But Zagara told the swarm to allow the Terran to pass into the palace because the queen valued him for whatever reason she had.

* * *

Sarah strode through the corridors of the palace. Dominion guards and auto gun defenses were stationed at every section and they opened up when they saw her. It was almost laughable to think they could think they could stop her with a handful of infantry after seeing the grand dominion army crushed before their eyes outside. But that was all a part of the pride of the Dominion: death for what they believed was the greater good in the name of the Emperor. After demolishing several lines on every level leading up to the top, Sarah encountered another line of troops accompanied by a walker mode Viking. They opened up on the entryway of the corridor when they saw the first sight of the Queen. The bullets kicked up dust and smoke from the walls clouding the area around where Sarah stood. The rounds kept hurling into the cloud of dust until the Sarah leapt clear of the cloud high into the air.. With the force of gravity and her primal powers, she darted down on top of the Viking and her entire body tore through the machine. The wires and cables clung to her body until her feet touch back down to the ground. She opened her eyes and focused her energy around her. Before the troopers could put their rifles on her, they were lifted off their feet and suspended in the air. Sarah then pushed her hands out and all the guards were launched in all directions slamming into the walls.

Floor by floor, Sarah tore through every barricade set up through the palace with ease. But it did take time to head up floor by floor taking out the guards stationed at each section of each floor. But after thirty minutes of fighting the guards and traveling up the nearly mile high Pyramid, Sarah was only several more rooms away from the Emperor's chamber. This was probably where Mengsk would have saved the best for last. She strode down the hall way focusing her senses to see and thing that the naked eye couldn't. And sure enough, the surprise was waiting for her. Sarah raised her hand in front of her just as several bullets came her way. The bullets diverted their directions away from here and slammed into the walls. Afterword, Sarah concentrated her energy and dispersed a pulse of energy from here mind. Several voices screamed in agony. In front of her, four ghosts decloaked and fell to the ground with blood spewing out between the gaps of their optic goggles. Fitting that the last of Mengsk's defenders would be what the things that she was once. But the four weren't the only ones, several of the other ghosts were still around. They must have managed to resist the psionic blast and saved their minds from being melted inside their heads.

Some of them declocked just as they channeled their psyonic energy. Tosh's specters learned to unleash concentrated psyonic attacks called psyonic lashes. The people running the ghost academy had learned a thing or two and trained their most gifted to handle the ability. But Sarah, being a class twelve psyonic had learned to resist attacks like that, both the mental damage on the brain and the bone crushing physical effects it had on the body. The lashes felt like being hit in the head by a baseball thrown at a professional pitcher. But with the fortitude she possessed, she shrugged off the impact and collected some of the energy thrown against her and threw it right back at the ghosts. Because the three ghosts weren't trained hard enough to resist a full direct lash, they got a really big dose of their own medicine. All three ghost's heads popped like corks off bottles of champagne having their blood be the substitute for the liquor.

All Kerrigan could do after she disposed of the rest of the ghosts was the futileness as well as the sadness of seeing people who were like her lay dead for the man who had manipulated them into becoming merciless killing machines. But Kerrigan shrugged off the feeling before it could take hold of anything in her mind. Mangsk was only several corridors away. Her task was now within arm's reach.

But there was one last surprise obstacle waiting for her. She turned to a corridor that lead into a wide open room that bore a large gold and red door at the end. She suddenly heard a buzz in her head. She stopped and looked around. The buzzing started to grow louder and louder until it sounded like a piercing screech that pierced her mind like a tiny needle. She cringed only slightly and brought her and to her left side of her forehead. Sarah knew what it was. It was a psy-screen. The nasty little device that disrupted psyonic life form's minds making it hard to concentrate and even cause severe and crippling pain to those who didn't know how to resist it. Fortunately, Sarah's class 12 rating and her primal powers allowed her to resist the screen just enough to only have it feel like a light migraine.

Just then Sarah sensed something coming behind her through the fog in her mind. She swiftly moved to her side and swung her hand with her razor sharp nails radiating with energy behind her.


End file.
